Dervish
Album: The Thrush In The Storm
Label: Whirling Discs
Tracks: 12
Website: http://www.dervish.ie

Sligo's finest can never disappoint, and this, their eleventh studio album in two decades, proves such - although on first playthrough the opening track, a typically well-assembled jig-and-two-reels set, may yield less a frisson of anything new than a comforting tingle of familiarity. Nothing wrong with that, of course, especially when the band members are all on such splendid form. For as always there's so much devil in the detail of the miraculous way the well-oiled machine turns so upliftingly onward (whirling around the contours of the tunes with fluency and abandon in roughly equal measure). And Dervish score points for introducing a pair of lesser-known tunes before launching into the more popular The Green Gowned Lass.

As always, though, it tends to be singer Cathy Jordan who scores the immediate audio points, with the general listener and the established fan alike, for her magnificent consistency of tone, her reliable versatility and her uncanny ability to get inside a song and take it beyond its arrangement. Her excellent performances among the disc's six songs include an enchanting and gorgeously moulded rendition of The Banks Of The Clyde (learnt from Gabriel McArdle), a lilting treatment of The Lover's Token (learnt from the singing of both Rosie Stewart and Frank Harte) and a more forthright take on Baba Chonraoi, together with the cheeky Snoring Biddy and an especially animated version of the Leitrim ballad Handsome Polly-O. Cathy also turns in a poised account of Shanagolden (from the pen of Sean McCarthy) - although the melody itself seems a touch bland and I'm not sure the band arrangement needs further augmentation with a double bass in this instance (even though it's played by Lúnasa's Trevor Hutchinson, who guests on some other tracks too).

The instrumental sets include a gloriously fulsome account of The Rolling Wave (one that you could drive your sheep by!), and a spirited barn dance/reel set (Maggie's Lilt), while the disc finale builds satisfyingly from an infectious slow hornpipe to the ruffled feathers of the title track. Finally, in this age of skimpy and inadequate packaging, it needs remarking upon that presentation is (as always with Dervish) attractive and properly detailed as regards sources, a credit to the band.

David Kidman