Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
There is a bind that ties the U.K. to North America that goes beyond the physical appreciation of its common and often misused language, more so than the rugged terrain and building blocks of democracy and historical values, it is the appreciation for the vast majority of times, in the importance of the two countries similar music tastes. Perhaps it goes further than that, it is interwoven in the thought of its ability to sow the seeds of its Celtic folk traditions to those over the edge of the Atlantic basin and the lost memories of the places that surround England, the beating conscious of artistic thought and the long established alternative view generated by hundreds of years rule from a pile of land that was once a monastery.
Celtic Folk travels both ways, the ocean, wide, expansive, is littered with the messages of thought lost in the serenity of a range of mountains, of deep forests and the people caught between it all and in Kyle Carey’s album, North Star, those people’s lives are given the range to breathe once more in a piece of rare quality blending, the exceptional and unique marriage of seemingly different houses.
It can be quite a surprise to anyone who hasn’t come across the style before to find that the two genres can be such a perfect fit and Kyle Carey deserves much recognition for making that blend more than palatable, she has made it uniquely fascinating.
Whether through tunes that harvest and unshackle the American way of life, that gently tiptoe through bleak but powerful songs of the immigration that America was founded upon, of the harshness that resides in the Appalachian mountains and the tales of life in the history of those that settled in the states that straddle the range, or the beauty that lives in the heart of Scottish thought, of a sound that makes the blood flow unhindered and with grace, North Star is a resounding set of songs, covered in anguis, sang in joy.
Tracks such as Casey Jones Whistle Blow, Norn O’ Kane, the very superb Wind Through Casper, Sios Dhan an Abhainn (Down To The River) and the final, almost heart piercing act, Across The Great Divide, all have the thought of reconciliation, not just in the marriage of the two genres but in deed and it is one that must be grasped.
North Star is an album of deep resonance, of great thought and the perseverance to make it happen, Kyle Carey has seemingly pulled off and impossibility.
Kyle Carey’s North Star is released on Americelta Records on March 1ST 2015.
Ian D. Hall