Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

There are the instruments to which seem to serve up with charm the ideal of a nation’s heritage, that resonance of sound, that digging deep into the D.N.A of the individual and the culture in which the soul has long been established, the instrument is more than a memory. It is a rallying call to the heart, to embrace, to love and to feel the pride seep out pf every pore like a storm of opportunity, a tumultuous and unrestrained moment in which to live forever in The Pipe Slang of our words and entice others to your cause.

We all our own way of making the instrument of choice talk for us, expressing more arguably than what can be said out loud, however for Jamie MacDonald and Christian Gamauf and their Co-producer Barry Reid, The Pipe Slang is more than a way to add to the conversation, to add the extra word of fortune into the exchange of ideas, it is an immense dialogue which rapidly, and unmistakably, takes place to enhance the day.

Slang may be a way in which to confound those around us so they don’t listen in and gather our thoughts in which to implicate and damn us, however it is a testament to the production values of Barry Reid, Jamie MacDonald and Christian Gamauf that this album takes shape and gives it an openness, a willing to be seen as both vulnerable and strong, to be exposed but showing undeniable visibility, a majesty.

With additional musicianship across varying tracks from Jack McRobbie on guitar, Adam Young on piano, Anna Rachel MacDonald on clarsach and vocals, Anna-Wendy Stevenson on viola and Sophie Stephenson who provides the step dance on The Step Dancer Reels, the album truly flows with the ease of a river heading down stream and the anger of the ocean that it feeds into.

In tracks such as Asturian, Calum Campbell’s, Tiree Melodies, the fantastic The Boy’s Lament For His Dragon and The End of the Road, Jamie MacDonald and Christian Gamauf truly revel in the openness, the showing of the Scottish Islands and their choice of the heritage around them.

An extraordinary album, one that is dynamic and holding on to a great sense of identity, one it is a privilege to know is being shared out and not locked away.  

Ian D. Hall

*Birnam