Bright Season
Album: Bright Season
Label: Folkstock
Tracks: 9
Website: http://www.brightseason.net

Whilst Bright Season may be a new name, the constituent parts, Michael J Tinker, Ella Sprung and Simon Dumpleton have appeared in a number of other acts as both featured artists and sidesmen where they have fine tuned their playing and singing, harmony and solos which ensures that as a whole they really understand working ideas and arrangements.

Their self titled debut contains nine tracks, both self penned and traditional, that shows a trio that is more than capable of getting the best out of what they choose to do. Some of the songs are inspired by dance rhythms others have more of a story tradition.

The vocal mix with in the band gives them a massive flexibility not only in the choice of songs, but how those songs are presented. A good example is "My Mother Taught Me How To Waltz", which though written from a male perspective features Ella Sprung as the lead vocalist, giving the song a different dynamic and a more natural feel than it would have had Bright Season chosen to instead switch the genders within the song.

The instrumentation on the album is pretty exceptional, simple and bright where it needs to be, but not afraid to be more complicated when the need arises. It helps burn the textures into the album as assuredly as a slower exposure burns the colours into a picture.

Call me ungrateful, but at around the thirty three minute mark "Bright Season" feels a little on the short side, granted there are albums that can make thirty three minutes feel like a life time you are never going to have back, this is definitely not one of them. As the notes of "The Yeoman's Son" fade away you realise that that's it, there's not going to be any more and you can't scream for an encore and somehow that doesn't seem fair, but arguably that does mean that the repeat button becomes your friend.

Neil King