Unthanks - Mount the Air

  by Benjamin Howarth

published: 22 / 2 / 2015

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The Unthanks were so taken by a comparison between their attitude to folk and Miles Davis' attitude to jazz in an ‘Uncut’ review of their last album (called ‘Last’, which luckily it has proven not to be) that they decided to live up to it directly, deliberately incorporating the sound and feel of ‘Sketches of Spain’ into the title track of their new album. Where many bands suddenly deciding to 'go jazz' would rightly be accused of running out of ideas, it is testament to the higher plane the Unthanks find themselves on that they sound like they've been playing this music their whole lives. 'Mount the Air' is being billed as their first album in four years, though that is not quite the case. In the intervening period, they have released three recordings – all album length – including a collaboration with an award-winning brass band, a soundtrack to a documentary about Newcastle's mining industry and an album of covers of songs by Antony and the Johnsons and Robert Wyatt. Those 'diversions', as they called them, whetted appetites and hinted that whatever came next from the band would be a step beyond anything we'd heard before. The Unthanks have a slightly messy biography – not ideally trimmed down to a single paragraph. They began life as Rachel Unthank and the Winterset, earning rave reviews for their striking takes on traditional folk music. By 2009, Rachel's younger sister Becky was an equal partner and the band's manager and producer Adrian McNally had stepped into the breach vacated by their previous pianist Stef Connor (who left to complete a PhD). McNally – something of a father figure to many in the UK folk scene as a busy producer – is also Rachel's husband, and as a full member, his interest in arranging string and horn parts became an ever stronger feature of the Unthanks music. They are often labelled as a folk band whose music is palatable to indie fans who would normally baulk at the words “trad arr.” on a record sleeve. But that's not really right – arch traditionalists may be unimpressed by the Unthanks’occasional concessions to modernity, but far from watering down their roots, the Unthanks are part of a vanguard (alongside the likes of Lau and Sam Lee) proving that folk musicians don't have to compromise in order to be something more than a heritage attraction. They may cover rock songs occasionally, but the Unthanks still sing in heavy Northumberland accents, dance jigs and organise singing camps. That all said, 'Mount the Air' finds the Unthanks at a point where they have effectively transcended genre – their takes on traditional songs flip so effortlessly between jazz, classical, ambient and post-rock as to make any attempt to put a label on them a waste of time. The epic title track, based on words found by Becky Unthank in the archives of Cecil Sharp House, has already been released in a shorter form as a single. But, here, its ten minutes are dazzlingly unpredictable, as the jazz trumpet and double bass segue against an unyielding (yet eerily simple) piano line and occasional surges of strings. It sounds both wildly experimental and comfortably familiar at the same time. As it reaches its climax, it all comes together into a dramatic crescendo, part Godspeed You Black Emperor and part musical theatre. Many of the Unthanks' contemporaries dress up their modern takes on traditional music with all manner of electronic clicks and studio tricks. “Mount the Air”, by contrast, is striking in how confident the Unthanks seem in their material – conventional sounding folk songs like 'Madam' and 'Died for Love' are presented at a stately pace, giving you time to take in every word. Having chosen not to include guitars in their line-ups, the music is presented with an unrelenting pin-drop intensity. Even when the tempo picks up slightly, such as on the eerie second single 'Flutter', the music retains its compelling, dramatic quality. The centrepiece of the album is another ten minute epic, the devastating 'Foundling', which takes the listener through a heartbreaking conversation between a mother and her abandoned child. This has all the emotional intensity of a short play, and a soundtrack to live up to it. The Unthanks seem utterly unaffected by the music scene. Did they not realise that none of the bands on BBC Sound of 2015 list have made seventy minute epics? Instead, they seem to have tapped into something a little deeper – there is a note of despair in every track here, but within that a heartwarming celebration of life. (It also seems apt that it is released to coincide with the much acclaimed adaptation of 'Wolf Hall' – I may not be alone in detecting a similar sense of purpose and restraint in this album as can be found in the BBC's sensitive adaptation.) What else can I say? Buy it, play it. And then play it again, and again and again.

Track Listing:-

1 Mount the Air
2 Madam
3 Died for Love
4 Flutter
5 Magpie
6 Foundling
7 Last Lullaby
8 Hawthorn
9 For Dad
10 The Poor Stranger
11 Waiting

Band Links:-

https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Unthanks/202472563113172
http://www.the-unthanks.com/
https://twitter.com/theunthanks

Label Links:-

http://cadizmusic.com/
https://www.facebook.com/CADIZMUSIC
http://cadizmusic.co.uk/

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