Niteworks, A’ Ghrian. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

To shy away, or even avoid drama is admirable, even lauded, especially in a world that has come to see drama as a chance to document every slight perceived and make others feel the retribution of the invisible force of the internet. Drama is a disease courted by those with axes to grind, drama is fuelled by a society losing its grip on dignity and seeing the whole way to fame is through the power of destruction.

What is required is a new dawn, a sense of decorum, and one that in which the only drama that is to be found is the one that causes us feel the heart inflame and the pulse quicken when art finds a new way to express itself, when it is in the realm of the cinematic and not in the thirty second rant captured by a media that is often anything but social.

A new dawn, the A’ Ghrian to which the sunrise is welcomed, and one that is captured with sheer delight and force by Skye’s Niteworks, is a new album which brings the use of language and music to the forefront of how we perceive just how drama is to be seen, not heard as a rebuke, not one in which to score points, likes or cry false tears when the abuse is returned, but of the dramatic, the air life that insists we see the larger picture and not the petty, the small and pathetic that titillates the trivial and lesser soul.

The four-piece band from the romantic, almost fairy tale like sounding Isle of Skye, Innes Strachan on synth/keys, Allan MacDonald on pipes, Christopher Nicolson on bass and Ruairidh Graham on drums, are joined by the indomitable guest vocals of the celebrated trio Sian, as well as Kathleen MacInnes, Beth Malcolm, Hannah Rarity, and Alasdair Whyte, as well as Fiona MacAskill, Aileen Reed, and Laurie Wilkie of the Kinnaris Quintet, and Susan Applebe on strings across the whole of A’ Ghrian, and one in which this giant ensemble explodes with a sense of valour and purpose that brings to mind Clannad at their finest pomp with the interweaving edge that comes from the beauty of the mix of electronica, folk, traditional and the Gaelic Muse.

A’ Ghrian, translated into English as The Sun, is rightfully unapologetic as tracks such as Each-Uisge, Gloomy Winter, Old Ghost’s Waltz, Bumpth, Teannaibh Dluth, and the album title track of A’ Ghrian all leave their indomitable, haunting mark on the listener.

A’ Ghrian is an album of powerful language, both musically and verbally, in character and in significant meaning, Niteworks’ insightful focus is one of expressive reason.

Niteworks’ A’ Ghrian is out now.

Ian D. Hall