Draw me a map
You know you’re in for a treat with a new Rachael McShane album, and with Ian Stephenson and Julian Sutton as the rest of the Cartographers she delivers yet again. Rachael needs no introduction, but I’ll do it anyway, she’s a virtuoso on the fiddle, viola and cello as well as a captivating singer. Her debut solo album, No Man’s Fool came out in 2009, her first album with The Cartographers, When All Is Still arrived in 2018. Oh, she was also part of a little known folk-pop group called Bellowhead and won some awards apparently.
Uncharted plots a course between the poles of adhering to the strictures of trad folk and the knowing when to tease it apart to find something new. Her music is a living thing rather than a by-the-numbers recitation, opening tracks Get Up Jack and Lady And The Sailor are perfect examples of this. Stephenson and Sutton’s talents are woven throughout the album and really shine on The Dusty Jigs and Shivering Stone. I love the fact that she can get backing singers like Janice Burns, Benji Kirkpatrick, Jonathan Proud, Sam Sweeney and Amy Thatcher to add a subtle layer of grandeur to the while affair.
Personally, when I see that the world is going to hell in a handbasket it’s so good to have something like this to hold on to, something that reminds you that not everything is grey, something that makes things better like a warm hug on a cold day. Uncharted is a welcome reminder that music has the power to do that.
Iain Hazlewood
