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Malinky Quartet
DEUTSCHLAND 2010 Pressefoto
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| | Reviews | | | | Selected media snippets for 'Flower & Iron''
The Guardian, Jan 09
"After all these years, Malinky should be one of the folk bands of 2009"
Boston Herald, Oct 2008
"Soars...recalls the halcyon days of Silly Wizard, the Battlefield Band and the Tannahill Weavers"
Boston Globe, Oct 2008
"May be the finest young Scottish band since Silly Wizard"
MOJO, March 09
“Scots music at its most evocative”
Irish Music Magazine, Dec 2008
"producing great music...another gem of Scottish folk"
fRoots Jan/Feb 09
"a class act...just gets better each time you play it"
Living Tradition, Nov/Dec 08
"just glorious"
Folking.com
"possibly one of the most lucid folk releases of 2008...bold and honest" | | | | Boston Globe, Oct 2008
This quintet may be the finest young Scottish band since Silly Wizard. Its gentle lilt, sly wit, and sweeping melodicism are as intoxicating as a fine single malt. | | | | Boston Herald, Oct 2008
Given the limits of traditional Celtic music, it’s hard for some young bands to distinguish themselves from the pack. Not so Scotland’s Malinky, which soars on the strength of three quality vocalists and recalls the halcyon days of such song-oriented bands as Silly Wizard, the Battlefield Band and the Tannahill Weavers. Add fine string playing and a knack for well-chosen traditional and modern songs, and Malinky’s fourth album is potent. | | | | The Guardian, Jan 09
Some good bands emerge in a blaze of publicity, while others keep plugging away for years before receiving the recognition they deserve. Malinky fall firmly into that second category. They have been playing (with different lineups) for a decade, and this is their fourth album. But though they have toured the US, and established a sizeable following back home in Scotland, they are not exactly folk celebrities south of the border. This subtle and varied set ought to change all that. The five band members include three lead singers, and the material (in English rather than Gaelic) ranges from a light and slinky reworking of the traditional Pad the Road Wi Me to more recent songs such as When Margaret Was Eleven, a thoughtful story of childhood and the damage of war, or Archie Fisher's postwar Clydeside lament, The Shipyard Apprentice, with impressive vocals from Fiona Hunter. Their playing is as impressive as their singing, matching fiddle, whistle, cello, bouzouki and guitar on light but rousing instrumental tracks. After all these years, Malinky should be one of the folk bands of 2009. [Robin Denselow] | | | | Scotland on Sunday, Oct 2008, by Norman Chalmers
Flower And Iron * * * *
The opening sung dialogue, to a charming original tune, contrasts Steve Byrne and Fiona Hunter (two of the band's five singers) in the old northeast favourite 'Pad The Road' and sets the varied tone of the latest incarnation of one of the most imaginative of Scots-language bands. They are fine instrumentalists all, and eschew vocals in the lilting 'Cows And Cottongrass' and the cello-driven waltz 'Ruaraidh Mor'. Mark Dunlop mixes metaphor and Irish myth in contemporary (well, 1960s) song, adding another dimension to a lovely album. | | | | Irish Music Magazine, Dec 2008, by Nicky Rossiter
An odd name, maybe, but you know the old street rhyme about Skinny Malinky Long Legs surely? This young Scottish band have done it again: “producing great music”, was my initial jotted note about Malinky’s latest CD.
The dozen tracks on offer here give full vent to this talented quintet and allow each to excel in the rendition of songs old and new. They have a beautiful gentle delivery that is evident from the first bars of the first song, Pad the Road Wi Me through to the final note of The Road tae Drumleman but the album is not all about highways.
The vocals of Fiona Hunter are to the fore on the lovely old ballad The Broomfield Hill with some very clever backing streaming in and out in a weave of magic. Next up we get a lovely anti-war song from the pen of the prolific Pete St John. This is the haunting When Margaret was Eleven taking a child’s eye view of fathers going away to war and even more poignantly coming home. The Shipyard Apprentice gives us another excellent slice of real life, this time in peacetime but just as powerful.
We get a musical epic of more than seven minutes on the wonderful story song of Sweet Willie and Fair Annie, which marries lyrics from 18th century Scotland with 20th century music from New England. Another lovely folk tale emerges on The Ploughboy and the Maid giving us that old story common to the tradition but given new life in the Malinky rendition. The set Why Should I? is unusual in that it combines two instrumentals but with a song in the middle.
The band lull us gently to the end with a beautiful song that although it sounds ancient is actually a product of the 20th century - The Road tae Drumleman. Malinky have produced another gem of Scottish folk with this CD complemented as it is with a well-produced insert giving lyrics and background notes to the songs. | | | | fRoots Jan/Feb 09
a class act...just gets better each time you play it
Malinky have been performing for ten years and this is their fourth album for Greentrax, containing songs and tunes from all over Scotland and from ireland. the current lineup features Fiona Hunter (vocals, cello), Steve Byrne (vocals, bouzoukis, guitars, Jew's harps, shruti box), Mark Dunlop (vocals, whistles, bodhrán, flute), Mike Vass (fiddle, guitar) and Dave Wood (guitar, bouzouki).
A notable strength of theirs is the richness of the vocals: all five sing and three of them take turns on lead vocal. They also possess a ealth of multi-instrumental talent, which they put to full use with inventive and varied arrangements, ringing the changes in musical texture, using creative harmonies and constantly bringing in fresh instruments throughout a song or set of tunes. Malinky are a class act, and the achieve the quality of musical accomplishment previously associated with the likes of Ossian, the Whistlebinkies and Ceolbeg. The elegance and complexity of their arrangements lend power and gravitas to all that they do. fiona Hunter's cello and Steve Byrne's bouzouki brilliance extend Malinky's sound palette well beyond that of most folk bands.
This album just gets better each time you play it. Broomfield Hill has a powerful Scots vocal performance from Fiona, with an imaginative edgy musical arrangement by Steve Byrne featuring didgeridoo, shruit box, Jew's harps, bouzouki, fiddle, guitar and bodhrán. When Margaret Was Eleven is a show-stopping song about the impact of war and imperialism on children. In this sonorous elegiac arrangement, the cello comes into its own, alongside fiddle, whistle, guitar and bouzouki, and Steve Byrne's vocal has an attractive vulnerability and honesty. Malinky's version of The Road Tae Drumleman (sung to the late Tony Cuffe's tune) is a joyous and moving act of love, tenderly performed with Fiona on vocal.
In the forthcoming Scottish Traditional Music Awards for 2008, Malinky have been nominated for Scottish Folk Band of the Year and Fiona Hunter for Scots Singer of the Year.
[Paul Matheson] | | | | Living Tradition, Nov/Dec 08
just glorious
Malinky now share a characteristic with Old Blind Dogs...and it's not a similar sound. Rather it's the fact that they sound like Malinky through both lineup changes and the passage of time. Karine Polwart left a couple of CDs ago and, against the odds, the still sounded like Malinky. This time around, Jon Bews (fiddle) and Ewan MacPherson (other stringed things) have left and Mike Vass and Dave Wood have joined. It's still very Malinky!
A little amusing factoid first...this CD was recorded by Jamie and Julia MacLean at Butterstone Studios. MacLean? Butterstone? Yep - Dougie's offspring and Dougie's studio respectively...and a very fine job of the record/mix process thay have made. The mix of material is also typically Malinky. They have an endearing tendency to head off back into their Mum's and Dad's collection of old LPs (remember them?) and revive hoary old chestnuts. Last time around it was My Ain Countrie, before that the Hills of Ardmorn, and this time Uncle Archie's well-sung, and still very splendid, Shipyard Apprentice gets Malinkied. There - they've become an adjective now.
Elsewhere, there are some lesser-known gems of songs and tunes. There's a robust, 7-minute cello-driven rendering of the sad tale of Sweet Willie and Fair Annie, a very jolly version of the Ulster Ploughboy and the Maid and the sign-off is a lovely wistful take on The Road tae Drumleman, a 1948 lyric with a Tony Cuffe tune...just glorious and very Cuffian.
You can tell that I like this. Fair braw.
[Alan Murray] | | | | Selected media snippets for 'The Unseen Hours'
"Malinky in most excellent form"
Penguin Eggs, Canada
"Not just back on their feet, but dancing...Few other bands are able to deliver so apparently effortlessly...an album which won't disappoint"
Songlines
"The new incarnation of Malinky is alive and doing very, very well"
Sing Out!
"very exciting"
The Living Tradition
"Do not let the Unseen Hours go unheard -- you will be the loser"
Rambles.net
"Scottish tunes and songs at their best"
LiveIreland.com | | |
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