Jura

"The mountainous, barren, blanket bog covered expanse of the island [of Jura] proved an ideal locale for the pairing of the Mekons and Fulks on a handful of original songs and ideas derived from folk songs and sea shanties. In this, they managed to create a sound more in keeping with the British folk rock tradition of the late '60s than the alt.country scene of the '90s. Given their unforgiving surroundings, it comes as little surprise that much of Jura is made up of hauntingly sparse ballads, leaden with melancholy and redolent of the salty sea air that no doubt swirled outside whatever structure in which these recordings were captured. In these spare, percussion-less acoustic recordings, they manage to tap into the heart and soul of their surroundings to create an album that transcends either's previous work, resulting in something wholly new and different ... Very close to perfect, Jura is gleefully light-hearted one moment and unbearably tragic the next, making it one ofthebest releases from either artist in some time".

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"An album featuring a handful of songs the Mini-Mekons ([absent are] longtime Mekons members Tom Greenhalgh and Steve Goulding) and Fulks composed and recorded while on the Scottish island that gave the LP its name. Recorded almost entirely with acoustic instruments, Jura finds the condensed Mekons dipping deeper into the traditional folk influences that informed 2007's Natural and 2011's Ancient and Modern. The presence of the ocean also makes itself known, as several of the tunes take the form of damaged sea shanties ... Jura feels more like a playful experiment than a major statement, but the talent and vision of these artists makes this a surprisingly powerful and impressive work, and is a testament to the fact both the Mekons and Robbie Fulks need to record more often. When they do, the results are never ordinary, and neither disappoints".

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