Esker

"Esker is the kind of album you immediately feel as if you've known all your life. It begins with the insistent, cascading piano of Aster, vying for attention with plunging slide guitar lines before giving way to the more traditional gnarled acoustic duelling of Twilight. It soon occurs to you that MacKay is an expert in conjuring moods and the kind of winningly versatile guitarist who seems unconcerned with repeating himself. On the appropriately sweet ragtime of Candy he seems to relish tying himself in knots with his playing before escaping Houdini-like, while the swampy Persona feels like the desperation of a humid, sleepless night come to musical life. Elsewhere the stately Wail occupies the same sort of melodic ballpark as Bird On A Wire and Song For The Siren, suggesting that MacKay is just as comfortable with conventional songwriting. Esker should see MacKay enjoying the same level of attention afforded to his old Chicago sparring partner Ryley Walker, check him out now".

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"Chicago-based folk-blues guitarist, with a psych edge - At times, it recalls the late-60s acid blues experiments on Leigh Stephens' Red Weather and Peter Green's The end of the game but with a shimmering summer optimism and textural complexity all MacKay's own".