"On Empty Cup, actually her third longplayer but her first of mostly traditional material, Rose utilises piano and sundry keyboards alongside various singing bowls, ocean drums and thunder tubes to create soundscapes that she cheerfully describes as blending her "lifelong fascination with sacred sound with wayward wanderings along the lanes of traditional songs." While the texts of these songs will be mostly familiar, the arrangements are very fresh and original indeed, often sung with multi-tracked vocal harmonies. Opener Molly Bawn is re-imagined in an urban context, with minimal beats. Red Red Rose places Robert Burns in a late night jazz club ... While stylistic similarities may be found in the work of contemporaries Sam Lee, Lisa Knapp or Jim Moray, it is Kate Bush and (especially) Sheila Chandra who may be regarded as Rose's closest musical antecedents. Katie Rose is, quite simply, a superb singer, and the inventiveness of these arrangements marks the maker of Empty Cupoutas something much more than just a talented folkie tarting-up her trad repertoire with a few "edgy" bleeps and beats. This is your actual English traditional soul music".
