Review on Netrhythms
http://www.netrhythms.com/reviews.html#pentangle
The Pentangle brand-name has always been associated with inspired, eclectic and genre-defying music-making, and its latest incarnation proves no exception.
The current lineup has been around since the mid-90s, when original vocalist Jacqui McShee teamed up with drummer Gerry Conway and keyboard player Spencer Cozens. That trio was recently expanded to a five-piece with the addition of saxophone (Gary Foote) and bass guitar (Alan Thomson), and Feoffees' Lands marks their third release.
Typically, they're heard to expand the envelope even further, with imaginatively jazzy treatments of four traditional folk songs (Banks Of The Nile, Two Magicians, Sovay, Broomfield Hill) sitting easily alongside five sturdy original compositions in a distinctly soulful, even jazzier mould, with one staple jazz standard (You've Changed) thrown in for good measure.
Each track genuinely complements the others while setting the other tracks' individual achievements into relief, and this new album is a superb demonstration of Pentangle's masterly - and completely natural-sounding - cross-fertilisation of folk and jazz with occasionally other world-music influences from reggae to African. It all cooks juicily, and makes for an exhilarating listen - over and over!
Also, there are occasions when the band selectively bring in a number of additional musicians (trumpet, trombone, flugelhorn, clarinet, kora, electric guitar) to swell out the instrumental palette, but the arrangements never swamp either the basic lineup or the impact of the material, and on numbers such as Nothing Really Changes really enhance the delicious grooves they've created.
The expert, nay virtuoso instrumental playing at all times provides the perfect counterpoint and an ideal setting, for Jacqui's eminently versatile and intelligently-phrased vocal work. She's never sounded on better form, pure and superbly controlled, expressive yet attractively cool - all those qualities you remember from her early performances, yet now with that extra edge of maturity and experience that lifts this whole production into the rarefied stratosphere that tends to be reserved for great albums. Which this one surely is, believe me!
David Kidman