Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

It seems there is always someone proclaiming that Far Better Days are ahead, especially if it matches with their own agenda. The promises come round quicker than an election leaflet being dropped through the door or the assurance of a less than sincere lover promising that they will learn from their mistakes and yet repeating the same clumsy moves over and over again. Yet in some ways there are always better times waiting, whether it is in the realisation that some people just suck the life out of you and all you have to do is walk away from the drama or in that one day someone, somewhere will show you the glimpse of the universe beating in harmony, some things are to held tightly and enjoyed; for there is the possibility that there are indeed Far Better Days to enjoy.

For Malinky, the promise is not only delivered, it is upheld in the strictest possible sense, for them Far Better Days is not just something to wistfully long for over a potent dream filled scotch as the fire roars in the splendid isolation of aspiration and smoke filled haze. For them the dram and the dream are intertwined, the music is let loose from its bondage and the past in which is important brings much hope to the future.

Far Better Days is the band’s fifth release and the songs that perhaps were seen to be in Folk hibernation, hidden away in collective memory but not being released in other form, come tumbling out from the dusty pages of history and revel themselves to be so vibrant that they resonate between the ages and ask for nothing but to be heard once more.

History teaches us so much and it takes people prepared to dig deep to find the truth that gets distorted, by foul means or by blinkered agenda. With traditional songs such as a translation of the Swedish song The Twa Sisters, the beautiful The Fairy King’s Courtship, The Bonnie Hoose o Airlie, the natural attraction of The Term Time and the bitter-sweet finish of The Wild Geese, adapted from a 1915 poem by Violet Jacob, Steve Bryne, Mark Dunlop, Fiona Hunter, Mike Vass and special guest Donald Shaw making an appearance on two songs, history is made real. The ordinary voice echoing across time and proving that whilst history as a subject was taught from the top down point of view, perhaps it can and should be seen from where the real words lay, not those of the statesmen but in those that stoke the fire of written revolution.

Far Better Days is at hand and Malinky have once more set out the sign post to the destination.

Ian D. Hall