I was a cat from a book

"There's a thread of anger that runs through these songs, but this is curtailed and tempered by the many lyrical declarations of fear that arise on tracks such as the Jill O'Sullivan duet "Just as Scared" and the understandably claustrophobic "The Fire and the Flames." In turn, these ruminations are never overbearing for the listener, as even the gentle, seemingly self-analytical gem "A Short Blues" is instilled with imagery of hope and "nothing but the sun." Ultimately, in I Was a Cat from a Book, Yorkston has delivered a measured, wise, and life-affirming record, which has the power to inspire".

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"Three stars feels a bit churlishly ungenerous to James Yorkston, a man with a vision so defined and individual that you feel compelled to take him entirely on his own terms, or not at all. His fifth album of original material - and his first for four years - rolls by like a river, all finger-picked guitars and delicate arrangements, and atop it all Yorkston's tremulous voice, quavering through lyrics that are poetic in intent but often just too dense to parse".

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