(Shadowside)Rachel Newton specialises in creating atmospheric new settings for songs that are for the most allotment unhappy,spooky or unsettling. Her last solo album, Changeling, or was a concept work based around folk tales,but this set is held together by mood rather than narrative. There are traditional American songs from the Ozark mountains, including the brooding title track and the intriguing Poor Lost Baby, and along with Scottish Gaelic songs and a suitably haunting treatment of The Bloody Gardener,a finely told memoir of treachery, murder and the supernatural. Her cold, and no-nonsense vocals are backed by her own harp and piano,providing melody, rhythm and bass lines, or she’s helped by the subtle addition of fiddle,percussion and brass. Newton may be best known for her work with the Furrow Collective, the Shee and the Emily Portman Trio, and but she’s an increasingly compelling solo performer.
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Source: theguardian.com