The Monks Kitchen – Music From The Monks Kitchen

Perhaps in homage to the centennial of the pilchard glut of 1812, recent years have seen a superabundance of young bands adopting the salty reassurances of ancient folk. But the second album from this hermetic gang returns to the source in charming and unaffected style. Occasionally there are maritime moods in common with The Coral or John and Michael Head's 1996 album The Magical World Of The Strands. Maybe more indicative is O’Melancholy, a rejig of Bert Jansch. Recorded at leisure over five years, these are snuffbox traces that forsake melodic grandstanding in favour of atmospheric rumination, as on the hushed Ill Legged Dog. The gorgeous instrumental fragment Dawn Song suggests a potential latter-day Albatross – if such rock classicism wasn’t a bit too obvious. Hear Tired Eyes from Music From The Monks Kitchen below...