Ballads of the Broken Few

The sound of Devon singer-songwriter and fiddler Seth Lakeman is well-known to many. This is his eighth studio album since his debut, Kitty Jay, in 2004 – an album that brought him a Mercury Prize nomination and much publicity as the face of a new mainstream folk revival. He has come a long way since then, and this album is aesthetically both unexpected and bravely striking.

Lakeman met Wildwood Kin – the vocal trio of Emillie and Beth Key and Meghann Loney – at a charity gig in their mutual home county of Devon. The four of them have teamed up with prolific producer Ethan Johns to record an album of haunting harmony singing and paired-back honesty that has the legacy of American spiritual folk performance running through its bones. In keeping with his strong sense of place, Lakeman chose to record these lonesome ballads live in the great hall of an ancient manor house. The play of his gravelly vocals against the girls’ voices and the dirge-like drone of his fiddle create a loping, rhythmic blues atmosphere. In collaborating with Wildwood Kin, Lakeman has found another rich new direction, continuing his move away from the bigger sound of his earlier records.