The Blossom
Album: The Shepherd's Calendar
Label: Medieval
Tracks: 12
Website: http://www.medievalrecords.co.uk

This beautifully-presented disc delivers what amounts to an original song-cycle - described at the front of the copious 32-page accompanying booklet as "containing twelve songs proportionable to the twelve months", which is a slightly clumsy way of saying that there's nominally a song for each month of the annual calendar. Having said that, things don't quite equate to that aside from the obvious structure-based allusion. Writer Paul W. Nash admits to have drawn his primary inspiration from 16th century poet Edmund Spenser (whose own The Shepheardes Calender was published in 1579), but that's as far as the analogy is to be taken, since his creations are songs with lyrics and not poems. Having said that, Hobbinol closely copies Spenser's original lyrics; the remainder of Paul's songs do share attributes with poetic form and attitude, and prove every bit as enjoyable and satisfying taken on those terms. The character of the settings is pure folk-pastoral, but with distinct wyrd-folk leanings. Think Incredible Strangely Forest Blondel and you'll be halfway there…

The Blossom will be unknown to most readers, I imagine. Hailing from Moreton-in-Marsh, Gloucestershire (the heart of Middle Earth, one might say), The Blossom was formed in 2010 as a progressive-acoustic-folk offshoot of prog-rock quartet Lyrian, consisting of Paul. W. Nash (multi-instrumentalist extraordinaire who also sings) and Alison Felstead (who shares vocal duties and plays bass). The Blossom's first album has been a long time in coming, and even a cursory spin will reveal the level of care and attention which has been lavished on its contents, extending from the crafted lyrics through to the busy, inventive and intricately detailed instrumental accompaniments. Plenty of mandolins, accordion, tinkly jingling twingling percussion (glockenspiel, bells), with occasional banjo, recorder (credited as "pipes"), piano and (infrequent) guitar. The latter aside, comparison might be made at times with the Incredible String Band at their most instrument-swapping stage but without the exoticism of their more obscure world-music flavours; at the same time, a similar parallel might be drawn in that The Blossom's vocals are on the eccentric side - again, not as wayward or polarised as the wilder ululations of the ISB but still quite unorthodox in their own way.

Perhaps it's the nature of the timbre or tonal range that sometimes the vocal parts give the impression of appearing tentative or slightly uncomfortable, even (it might be thought) a touch precious or mannered (Paul uses a delicate falsetto mode quite a lot), and thus on occasion require some getting used to. Having said that, The Blossom turn in some accomplished harmony work, and the solo singing displays not just an inherent tenderness but also a sensitivity to its subject matter. When it all hangs together, as on Song Of The Hare, the effect is bewitching in the extreme. Of the other tracks, The Black Dove, The Feast Of Pavilions and A War Among The Flowers are particularly satisfying, while the romance of Rust Upon The Rose also benefits from a swooning fiddle contribution from guest musician Lucile Deslignères. Several of the songs play in continuous sequence, without appreciable between-song breaks or joins. And two of the individual songs are rather long - disarmingly so, it must be admitted, but they're a tough proposition perched at the epicentre of the 73-minute disc. The central pair of tracks clocks in at 13 and 14 minutes respectively - which might prove a drawback to the average listener, for their sprawling, episodic structure is not always easy to discern or delineate even on several plays. A recurring hallmark of The Blossom's music, whatever the length of tracks or the keen sense of direction, is that there's always the feeling of a surfeit of ideas, and notwithstanding the delicate, spare textures there's a lot going on. So this CD fairly demands a certain amount of effort on the part of the listener. Having made that effort, I was amply rewarded, but still feel the need to make even more effort to get the most out of The Blossom's highly individual yet in the end more than mildly enigmatic artistic creation.

David Kidman