Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
Life is a magic, sometimes a beautiful and intensely passionate one that captivates the soul, occasionally one that is filled is the sorrow and grief of all that has passed, individually and collectively, and yet both must be experienced with grace, with meaning, and one that whether you walk the road alone, or in the company of others, must give way to mercy.
The Merciful Road is one that seeks the inspiration of grace in all its forms, and one that requires the belief of all lest it turns sour, for mercy and hope are the sisters of optimism, more elegant, more assured, and less likely to be destroyed by the weapons of smug satisfaction and the unkindness of a darker, more insidious magic, that of arrogance and wilful self-destruction.
In their third album, James and Sam Gillespie set forth on The Merciful Road with an energy that encompasses defining beauty, the path of harmony, the ethereal flutter of earthly encounters, and the embracing of the soul.
It is in the encounter with nature at its most spectacular to which Wordsworth, Gary Snyder, and Ralph Waldo Emerson all captured and framed their surroundings, and to which The Brothers Gillespie have also grasped, tenderly handled with care, and as the natural seeps into the veins, as the experience of their visions and mutual change, what is addressed is patience, of being closer to what we truly are as animals rather than thinking we are somehow above nature, beyond reproach for our actions.
Across tracks such as Wingrove Road, Great Aunt Katherine, Albion, When The Fortune Turns The Wheel, and The Endless Road, The Merciful Road opens up as a Folk classic and one that is a worthy successor to the pair’s previous release, the entrancing The Fell.
Life is about digging deep when the arrows of Time declare their intentions in a less than positive way, of sharing the reverence for life, and the privilege of being so close to the natural abundance of inspiration that we often, habitually, take for granted. The Merciful Road, the path of winding dreams, the streams and woods of compassionate release, they are to be found with honour in this scintillating and beautiful album.
Ian D. Hall