The Shee
Album: Murmurations
Label: Self Released
Tracks: 11
Website: http://theshee.com

The all-female sextet has already delivered two exceptionally fine album releases which have stood up to much repeated play in this house, and in many ways Murmurations follows the successful pattern of the earlier records. Once again it relies entirely on the band members' own considerable talents; with a host of instruments and no less than three strong lead-singers, they have no need to engage any guest musicians. They also make a virtue of recording as much as possible live together in the studio, here again under the production guidance of Duncan Lyall and utilising the engineering expertise of Stuart Hamilton to bring out the essential details of their own skilled musical arrangements.

A particular Shee trademark is the brave and equal-handed exploration of texture and idiom through an ever-enterprising mix of self-penned and traditional material. And so Murmurations proves, with its lively and effervescent playing allied to uniformly elegant and keenly accomplished musicianship. The Shee also possesses a distinctive instrumental complement, which enables great contrasts of scoring to be tellingly exploited whether in a stripped-back medium or with no holds barred - and their lineup's also notable for having no guitars, instead concentrating on electroharp and clarsach (Rachel Newton) and - unusually for this kind of ensemble - mandolin (Laura-Beth Salter) to provide the all-important plucked string textures to underpin and/or counterpoint the melody lines of flute (Lillias Kinsman-Blake), accordion and harmonium (Amy Thatcher) and fiddle and viola (Shona Mooney and Olivia Ross).

The band does, however, ring one important change with Murmurations, for instead of kicking off proceedings with a blazing, dazzling display of uptempo virtuosity they bravely choose to stun the listener into submission by engaging the raptest of attention for a beautiful rendition of Down In The Broom, sparsely scored with the darkest of viola and fiddle timbres offsetting Olivia's chillingly apt vocal. This track, it turns out, ties in really neatly with the album's bookend-finale, the Gaelic love song An Till Mise Chaoidh, which Rachel sings as to the manner born. In between these captivating moments, we find an alternation of instrumental and vocal tracks, beginning with a kind of introduction to the band and their instruments via a coupling of two sparkling tunes composed by Calum MacCrimmon and Amy herself. This track is typical of the band's inventive approach to scoring in conjunction with the optimum interweaving of parts, constantly maintaining listener interest while ensuring that fellow players are kept well and truly on their toes too! They make great use of syncopation on the Strut set, where there's plenty of delightful swopping-around of melody and harmony lines, and the Highlands And Flatlands set ingeniously pairs Olivia's plangent homage to the Highland vocal air with Laura-Beth's depiction of the flat Lincolnshire landscape.

The vocal tracks range from Rachel's fiery account of the Child ballad Three Knights to Laura-Beth's relationship-breakdown song Our Bottle (oddly reminiscent of Lal Waterson, I thought) and Olivia's Pity Me and Laurel Premo's Sugarwine, each in its own way Americana-inspired. A notable feature of the majority of the vocal tracks is the creative way that all three singers are used for dramatic effect - another Shee trademark… The album title represents with brilliant accuracy the constantly shifting, endlessly evolving flight patterns of starlings, the music within reflecting the jizz and dynamic of those birds in its interaction between the group and the specific players, drawing heavily on their individual influences while maintaining a cohesive yet ever-changing collective approach and sound. In that context, one final word of praise must go to the graphic design element of the uniquely attractive package, whereby every single album cover has been individually illustrated by the Lillias herself. Right down to the promo copies, in fact - which is such a nice change from the usual, annoyingly skimpy CDRs or downloads provided by many agencies nowadays. In my opinion this only strengthens my personal conviction in the importance of the whole package - in Lillias' words, to "give people something unique and personal that couldn't be experienced from downloading the music"; a wholly admirable philosophy, and yet another instance of the very special honesty and integrity that characterises everything The Shee does. The classy package, like the music within, is a true work of art.

David Kidman