Ribbon Road
Album: Roadside Dreams
Label: Shipyard
Tracks: 11
Website: http://www.ribbonroadmusic.com/

I'll hold my hand up there were a couple of real surprises I found out about this album, the first is that it's Ribbon Road's seventh album, somehow I'd managed to miss every previous cut from the band, secondly that the band are very much a family affair, multi-tasking singer-songwriter Brenda Heslop is joined on the album by husband producer Geoff and daughter Jill.

I try to console myself with the thought that I've missed the previous cuts because there is a very northern aspect to the band's sound. Brenda is a working shepherdess in the Northumberland Hills and you can hear the region in every syllable, every inclination. In my heart I know that's not the answer, but I now know there are another six albums I need to hear.

Whilst indisputably this is an album of the region, it's also a very universal album and that is down to the strength of the writing. At times this is a truly heartbreaking album, "Baby Baby" is a song about grieving motherhood that cuts right through the chest. It's not the only song on the album capable of doing that, not by a long shot.

This is an album of aural poetry and from the moment you look at the sleeve, to the moment the last note of the last song fades from your ears you know what a stark beauty you have gone from anticipating to absolutely enjoying.

This is a class in simplicity and yet at times it almost sounds like jazz, more often than not it sounds of bleak hills and dry stone walls. A scene that you can look at as being dull and grey or monochrome at its most startling beauty and I know which camp I'm in.

This a strong album and one that makes you feel stronger for hearing it and that's never a bad thing.

Neil King