House and Land

"House and Land is the new collaboration of Asheville guitarist Sarah Louise Henson with fiddle player Sally Anne Morgan. The tension between new and old, between folk and avant-garde, is its driving force ... House and Land's self-titled debut feels expansive and immersive while using the simplest resources. Its source materials stem from centuries-old folk songs, so traditional they share lines with Old Testament verses. But Louise and Morgan attack them with urgency and excitement. The record's best moments, like "The Day Is Past and Gone" and "Rich Old Jade," are warmly psychedelic, proceeding patiently with minimal percussion and unfolding into new shapes at every turn. Other songs take up smaller spaces. "Listen to the Roll" is nearly a capella, with Louise singing sternly over a low drone. "I had to answer for myself," she repeats, adding an ominous edge to the melody by raising her voice just a half-step between the syllables of "answer." It's a haunting sound,showingjust how much these musicians can communicate with such sparse arrangements".

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"[The] pairing [of Sally-Anne Morgan and Sarah Louise Henson] as House And Land finds them exploring ten traditional songs, sourced largely from unaccompanied versions recorded by the likes of Jean Ritchie, Roscoe Holcomb and Shirley Collins, in a minimal soundscape of modal harmonies, microtonal ornamentation and drone. Several of the selections are hymns, including an Old Regular Baptist version of "Guide Me O Thou Great Jehovah" (unaccompanied, save for Morgan's spectral fiddle) and "The Day Is Past And Gone" - on which Thom Nguyen's drums entwine with Sarah's twelve-string guitar like a briar and a rose, transforming the song into a thrillingly extemporised Appalachian raga ... The album's closing track is (...) "Unquiet Grave". That oft-quoted Bob Dylan line about folk music - "it's weird, man, full of legend, myth, Bible and ghosts" has rarely rung truer. There's an undeniably haunted [or "spooky"] quality to this record, but it's also one that's located squarely inthepresent ... My favourite record of the year, thus far".