Kevin MacNeil & Willie Campbell
Album: Visible From Space
Label: An Lanntair
Tracks: 12
Website: https://www.facebook.com/WillieCampbellAndKevinMacNeil

I certainly didn't know quite what to think when this CD landed on my doorstep. Judging by the nightmarish black and white photograph on the sleeve it was probably a recording by long lost members of "Leather-Face's" family from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre who had turned to 'pop music' for their salvation or was there something more sinister hidden beneath the jewel case…perhaps some razor blades or suchlike? No, but there was something quite disturbing emanating from the silver disk mainly through hypnotic use of what I can only describe as plodding under-played drum rhythms and judicious use of echo and reverb on the guitar by Willie Campbell.

This is the kind of album that once you've put it on you play it to the end because you're held captive by the sheer audacity and skills of the performers in melding together cohesive use of poetry and 'out-there' music. There's something almost Gothic in MacNeil's use of prose, maybe a bit like the first time you encounter a 'Rebus' novel by Ian Rankin but if you allow yourself a moment of reflection you might find you're reluctantly drawn to a place you never wanted to admit was in your own thoughts.

Of course, this way of thinking could open up a whole new can of worms but inspiring it really is. Usually I'd be the first to run a thousand miles away from such lurid detail but in fact found myself mesmerised by the articulate detail and storytelling much like that of a child bewitched by a tale from the Brothers Grimm. Buy it and see what I mean.

Pete Fyfe