Aug. 3rd: Trying to talk over the sound of rushing blood

Karine Polwart- Scribbled In Chalk (2006, Spit & Polish)

I don't know why it's taken me this long to  listen to this album: I bought it years ago, I've seen Karine Polwart live about 3 times for various reasons, I knew I had this somewhere, and every time I thought 'you have to listen to that CD' but..didn't. Now she's come to my attention again as part of the Burns Unit 'folk supergroup' and I finally got off my arse and gave this album a shot.

Polwart was the lead singer of Scots folk band Malinky, and has collaborated with various other folky people- the Battlefield Band, Lau, etc etc.Scribbled In Chalk is her second album, after 2004's Faultlines. She has a lovely, unmistakeably Scottish voice. The words that come to me listening to this are 'accessible folk'. In fact I'm wondering whether I'd categorise this as folk at all- but everyone else seems to be, so I guess I must be the odd one out. To me almost every track here could fit right in on the playlists of modern commercial radio, particularly Radio 2. The album is very much in the 'radio-friendly female singersongwriter' mould, albeit with the occasional bit of piano accordion. If you like Emma Pollock, or King Creosote's major label outings, you'll like this. Intelligent, adult pop-rock, basically. 'Hole In The Heart' and 'Baleerie Baloo'-about a Scots missionary killed at Auchwitz- are particular standouts, but it's all of a pretty high standard. 'Terminal Star' has a really great string arrangement, as does the aforementioned 'Hole...'
I really can't knock this; there are other albums which move me, excite me, make me dance,whatever, more, but Scribbled In Chalk is a really nice listen, especially if you like distinctive voices.

Dec.19th:You could have made my summer-I should have leapt upon you

James Yorkston- The Year of The Leopard (Domino,2006)

Confession time: I am a huge Fence Collective fan, of which James Yorkston forms a part-hell, it's through Fence that I heard about the 100 Days project. Despite this, I don't know James Yorkston's work that well. I own most of the records, but haven't got round to listening to all of them properly. I've seen him live twice but still, only know a couple of albums properly. This is one I don't.

It's pretty much the archetypal JY album; acoustic guitar, the occasional clarinet, accordions, fairly sedate. There are some really lovely songs on this- in particular 'I  Awoke', in a less spartan arrangement than on his mini-album Hoopoe, the title track and 'Summer Song'. In a way, the album is strangely predictable. There are no huge surprises and the tracks pretty much flow into each other (except for the stream-of-conciousness vocal/electronic combo of 'Woozy With Cider'. That's not necessarily a bad thing; it makes for an album that works as a cohesive whole. Although this is a more immediately accessible collection, I'd still say that I prefer JY's 2002, Moving Up Country.

Dec. 7th: Look around for someone lying in the sunshine

Pentangle- Basket Of Light (Transatlantic, 1969)

Basket Of Light was Pentangle's most commercially successful album, largely due to the use of 'Light Flight' as the theme tune of 70s BBC drama  Take Three Girls. 'Light Flight' opens the album and has one of the best intros to a folk song I've ever heard. Time signatures all over the place, jazz inflections: amazing. The rest of the album is just as good- sitar solos! Train imitations! Bowed bass! . There are so many 'high points' of Pentangle, Jacqui McShee's voice, Bert and John's playing, the rhythm section- that the description becomes a bit meaningless, because it's all good. A definite classic folk album.

Dec. 6th; This state of emergency; how beautiful to be

Rory Campbell-Intrepid (Vertical,2007)

Rory Campbell is a Scottish piper, singer and songwriter. He's played in a fair number of current Scottish folk bands: Old Blind Dogs, Deaf Shepherd (see what they did there?), The Big Spree, etc. Intrepid is a mix of traditional Gaelic songs given the modern fusion treatment, traditional and modern pipe and whistle tunes, self-penned songs and something else we'll get to in a minute.
Of the songs, there is a nicely-done version of 'Oran Nan Mogaisean' (Song Of The Mocassins), where a man sings the praises of his (badly made) shoes, and two English songs, of which 'Dreams' would fit nicely into any Radio 2 or adult contemporary playlist.  The tunes, including some written for his son and wife, flow over an effective acoustic-guitar-and- percussion backing; I'm not a piper so I can't comment on the technically proficiency, but it sounds great to me.
And then I read the tracklist. Track 5: Joga. It can't be the Bjork song, can it? Well, actually, it can. A Scottish folk musician singing a song by an Icelandic female pop star. It shouldn't work, but it does, and quite successfully too, turning it into a laidback acoustic ballad which Campbell's voice suits well.
It's the most surprising thing about Intrepid. A seeming disparate mix of pipe tunes old and new, English original songs, traditional Gaelic (and Bjork) shouldn't go together, but this collection does