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Review of Joku Raja Rakkaudesakin

Joku Raja Rakkaudesakin

Pauanne

Nordic Notes

Rating: ★★★★★

Joku Raja Rakkaudesakin (Even Love Should Have Its Limits) – a phrase the Finnish folk duo of violinist Kukka Lehto...

Reviewed by Chris Wheatley in issue: June/2025

Review of Cervantine

Cervantine

A Hawk and a Hacksaw

LM Duplication

Rating: ★★★★

As album openers go, ‘No Rest for the Wicked’ is an epic one. It takes that Central European village-band call-and-response...

Reviewed by Matthew Milton in issue: March/2011

Review of Viena

Viena

Värttinä

Top of the World

Westpark

Rating: ★★★★★

Having worked with Värttinä earlier in 2015, I had a sense that their new album was going to be something...

Reviewed by Fiona Talkington in issue: April/2016

Review of Midnight and Closedown

Midnight and Closedown

Lau

Top of the World

Reveal Records

Rating: ★★★★★

After a wait of nearly four years the British folk scene's bravest experimenters are back with their fifth studio album,...

Reviewed by Robin Denselow in issue: March/2019

Review of Divine

Divine

Oana Catalina Chitu

Asphalt Tango Records

Rating: ★★★

Maria Tanase is often referred to as ‘the Romanian Piaf’: both were distinctive vocalists who took a local vernacular music...

Reviewed by Garth Cartwright in issue: Aug/Sept/2013

Review of Sarawoga

Sarawoga

Oliver Mtukudzi

Sheer Sound

Rating: ★★★★

Dedicated to his son Sam, who died in a tragic car accident, the Zimbabwean veteran’s latest album opens with the...

Reviewed by Nigel Williamson in issue: June/2013

Review of La Llorona

La Llorona

Chavela Vargas

Milan

Rating: ★★

While she could play the tragic heroine with a bleeding heart with the best of them, Chavela Vargas was also...

Reviewed by Chris Moss in issue: April/2018

Review of Udondolo

Udondolo

Urban Village

Top of the World

Nø Førmat!

Rating: ★★★★

It is unsurprising that black South African music in recent years has lacked the game-changing potency it enjoyed when soundtracking...

Reviewed by Nigel Williamson in issue: March/2021

Review of Live at the Royal Albert Hall

Live at the Royal Albert Hall

Music from the Penguin Cafe

Editions Penguin Cafe EPC023

Rating: ★★★★

Between 1972 and 1997, The Penguin Cafe Orchestra cut a unique and much¬loved swathe through that musical realm where folk,...

Reviewed by Tim Camming in issue: October/2010

Review of The Sea is My Brother

The Sea is My Brother

Harbottle & Jonas

Brook View Records

Rating: ★★

The fourth studio album from Devon folk duo David Harbottle and Freya Jonas is a concept album about the sea....

Reviewed by Nathaniel Handy in issue: May/2019

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