This Too

For the follow-up to their acclaimed debut album Free One in 2017, this Glasgow-based instrumental ensemble of fiddlers Laura Wilkie, Aileen Reid and Fiona MacAskill, alongside mandolinist Laura-Beth Salter and guitarist Jenn Butterworth, found themselves compelled to face the challenge of reproducing their live energy and spontaneity through a period of time that spanned a pandemic, multiple lockdowns, two new babies within the band and the difficulties of creating music remotely.

It’s impressive, then, that This Too sounds quite so spirited, uplifting and inclusive, right from the album’s lively opening track ‘Wonderful’, comprising tunes dedicated to Reid’s big brother Christopher and folk musician and friend John Somerville, along with a third tune ‘Wonderwomen’ celebrating ‘the women of the trad scene, inspired by the BIT Collective’ (who promote equality in Scottish traditional music). Further into this sparkling yet unshowy disc, ‘Burdland’ gleefully features ‘a wee musical nod to Joe Zawinul of Weather Report’s ‘Birdland’’ while the subsequent selection ‘Bonobos’ is dedicated to those ‘mischievous creatures, also capable of altruism, empathy, compassion, patience, sensitivity and kindness,’ a sentiment that seems to somehow encapsulate this entirely loveable disc.