Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
Home may be where the heart lays, but the soul is not content until it has the music in which fills every room, every emotion, only then does it allow the human machine with all its nooks, crannies, desires and wants to declare, this is Where I Belong.
It takes time to understand that self-declaration, and even then, we can be wrong, we can be found defending our position when the truth is we haven’t yet heard the right song or combination of tracks in which to truly feel at home.
For anyone though with the blood of myths and legends beating in time with their soul’s belief, where they belong will always be somewhere across a border, where tradition is caught up in a sense of identity, and where storytellers and musicians, artist all, break bread in the comfort of a roaring fire in the most tempestuous of storms.
James Bauld knows exactly where he belongs, in that is by the side of the listener and massaging the soul with his own creative style, one that is of certain truth and industrious thought, whilst all the time captivating the senses as tracks such as Holding It In, the sublime Accidental Guest, Walking Back From La Fontaine, Final Steps To The Waters Of Leith, Partick Interlude, and the glory of Out For The Rain, explore themes of the self-voyage and the need to find that one true home, it becomes clear that home is exactly where you thought it might be, right where you left it…in your soul.
An album built around the persuasive sound of the wooden flute might be difficult to imagine, and yet in the same honour bound display of temptation of a direct sound espoused by the likes of Peter Gabriel and Ian Anderson, James Bauld treats the listener to a series of moments that add to the complexity and drama of the aural voyage.
With hugely influential contributions from Michael Biggins, Euan McLaughlin, Lauren MacDonald, Callum Cronin, Chloe Bryce, and Zak Younger Banks, James Bauld’s Where I Belong is the tune to which all can follow back to the place they each call home; no matter where it lays, no matter the transport, and all because the sound of a master carries them onwards.
James Bauld releases Where I Belong on March 10th.
Ian D. Hall