Niamh Parsons: Blackbirds and Thrushes (Green Linnet)
Returning from the dodgier climes of MOR (her last album with the Loose Connections) to the solid Irish roots of her singing, Parson's big, sensuous voice drives these traditional songs through the arrangements of Gavin Ralston's guitars and John McSherry's moaning pipes. Apart from her goose-bumpy, quavering ornament, Parsons steers flexibly through the keen, unaccompanied verses of Banks of the Nile and Thomas Davis's Flower of Finae; the sweetness of Sally Sits Weeping; the swelling early-Dolores treatment of The Kilnamartyra Exile and Wounded Huzzar (with accordionist Josephine Marsh); or the sean nos duet with Danu's Ciaran O Gealbhain on Droimeann Donn Dilis, a defiant, land-less Deise hybrid. A moving, core-musical album, which well justifies the respect she enjoys in the business. By Mic Moroney
The Afro-Celt Sound System: Release, Vol 2 (Real World)
Having become a stadium phenomenon, these techno-trad space-cakes have been back in the Real World studios for another big, ear-slapping, ambient/dance-mix album. As before, the triplet-based African and Irish rhythms neatly mesh bodhrans, koras, talking drums and even uilleann piper Ronan Brown's looped tune-phrases. On vocals, N'Faly Kouyate meets Iarla O Lionaird's blissed-out laments, while Sinead O'Connor lays it all bare again on the title track. The band often lose sight of the exit in those big seven-minute groove tracks, ecstatically fusing with the live jungle beats in an electro-sonic environment which harks back through the mists of pop archaeology to dub reggae, Kraftwerk-era synths and Moog drones. But the pace is always slammed home, so don't ever stop dancing to ask what it all means. By Mic Moroney
