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fRoots magazine is the essential resource for folk, roots and world music – local music from out there. We’ve always been central to the UK folk scene and were the pioneering, original world music magazine from year zero. We constantly support new young artists while celebrating the established: joining up the dots.

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Every issue is packed with news, in-depth features and interviews, reviews, opinion, insights – backed by nearly four decades of experience, activism and enthusiasm. You can’t afford to miss one!

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TWO YEAR SUBSCRIPTION BRIBE! For new paper sub- scribers or renewals: a FREE CD if you subscribe for 2 years. See the full list at www.frootsmag.com including albums by Stick In The Wheel, Tim Jones & The Dark Lanterns, Martin Simpson, Leveret, Eliza Carthy & The Wayward Band, Kries, Monoswezi, Derroll Adams, Jim Moray, Kristi Stassinopoulou & Stathis Kalyviotis, Songs Of Separation, The Rheingans Sis- ters, Kandia Kouyate, Bob & Ron Copper and great compila- tions including Ghosts From The Basement and Rough Guides to English Folk, Blues Songsters, Bottleneck Blues.

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ORCHESTRE TOUT PUISSANT MARCEL

DUCHAMP Sauvage Formes Bongo Joe BJR 027

Recorded at Real World Stu- dios and produced again by the famed John Parrish (PJ Harvey etc), the Swiss-based fRoots 393 cover stars and much talked-about crowd- pleasers of the 2015 Womad finally return after a little sabbatical (having babies

was involved) with a more than worthy fol- low-up to 2014’s fabulous Rotorotor.

Fans (who tend to be dedicated and excitable) will be pleased to know that every- thing they love about what we recklessly tagged “the best band ever that you’ve never heard of (apart from Dog Faced Hermans)” is all present here. Liz Moscorola’s engagingly mellifluous vocals and violin, Aida Diop’s rip- pling, rattling marimba, Wilf Plum’s unre- strained percussion, leader Vincent Bertholet’s driving bass, Mael Saletes’ spiky West African influenced guitar, plus trombone textures, lots more percussion, strings and vocals all serve to fill out their conceptualist wall of sound. There seems to be a lot more of them than ever!

There may not be a song about a revolu- tionary sheep on this one, but folkist ears will perk up in pleasure at the inclusion of the tra- ditional Scottish song, Across The Moor, though suffice to say it’s anything but con- ventional folk rock.

All reviewers have favourite, over-used adjectives and mine’s probably “exhilarat- ing”. Trouble is, that doesn’t really do this band or this album any sort of justice. It really is one of the most thrilling, inventive, joyfully wig-bending and challengingly fun records you’ll hear in quite a while. Find a track on this issue’s fRoots 69 compilation.

I’m really hoping that we get the oppor- tunity to see them live again soon (I’ve never really recovered from first catching them in the cramped bowels of a harbourside barge just down the hill from the fRoots dungeon). They really are one of the best live bands on the planet, but unlike many such outfits they do seem to have the rare knack of capturing it in the studio.

Buy it at otpmd.bandcamp.com Ian Anderson

ANDY IRVINE & LUKE PLUMB Precious Heroes Andy Irvine AK-7

Around the time of his 70th birthday concerts in Dublin a couple of years ago, it felt like Andy’s voice was crack- ing and was maybe on the way out. If so, he must have suddenly found some mirac- ulous elixir – the voice is back to its customary warmth, the

perfect vehicle for the detailed narrative that occupies the majority of this beautiful album. Even as he sings an elegy to the mining indus- try (Here’s A Health To Every Miner Lad), the grisly death of Australian outlaw Ben Hall, Ewan MacColl’s tribute to truck drivers, Champion At Keeping Them Rollin’ and the life and times of left wing activist and Span- ish Civil War freedom fighter Frank Ryan or the bloody carnage of Dunlavin Green, he still sounds like a comfort blanket.

He’s a words man and there’s plenty of them, but the song element is matched all the way by the musicality, arrangements and instrumentation. For this, Shooglenifty’s great