The new album from Red River Dialect, Abundance Welcoming Ghosts, is probably the kind of thing I'm not going to entirely love. It's not that I don't appreciate the genre on this release, out now on Paradise of Bachelors, but, rather, that I'm sort of out of time for modern interpretations of this sort of folk music. Still, the playing here is of such a high level that those words seem churlish of me to type, and the intentions behind this record are undoubtedly serious.
I suppose that might be the problem for me. "Two White Carp", its quiet hooks carried forward on the rich vocals and the mournful violin, is just too serious. And while "Snowdon", about the mountain in Wales, where this album was recorded, hits at something majestic, the tune isn't quite loose enough to fully captivate. Elsewhere, "My Friend" is a bit looser, helped in part by the presence of Tara Jane O'Neil (Rodan) here. "Salvation" at least works up a sweat, things heating up into the kind of frenzy that fans of The Waterboys might find familiar. Abundance Welcoming Ghosts is expertly played, sure, but it's the kind of album that's easier to admire than love. And while moments of austere, stark folk-infused beauty abound here, there's something else bleak and windswept happening on this release.
Abundance Welcoming Ghosts is out now via Paradise of Bachelors.
More details on Red River Dialect via the band's official Facebook page.
[Photo: Alice Jackson]