Today it’s the 3rd of February, which means the first Friday of the month is fast approaching. And since the start of the corona pandemic,that has become a special day on Bandcamp. Why? Well, every first Friday of the month Bandcamp wave away their share of the revenue of the music you purchase from their site, giving the artists that extra boost to help them through these rough times. Ever since we got wind of this initiative, I tried to review an album that is only available on Bandcamp in the week before Bandcamp Friday. Well, this time we didn’t find one album, we found three!
Två Fisk Och En Fläsk was a young Swedish folk band that released three records between 1998 and 2016. Starting out playing ‘classic’ medieval folk, the bandmember’s diverse musical backgrounds surfaced and the sound quickly turned towards alternative prog-folk. We managed to contact Jan Liljekvist, one of the former violinists of the band, and he was quite willing to tell Två Fisk’s story. And here it is.

When an album gets featured as a Daily Disc, a full review AND a Monthly Marker, you know it has to be something special. And the newest ZiRP album is just that. Something really special. With Circle Divine, ZiRP ‘invents’ a whole new genre: instrumental fusion folk-funk. and we at Celtcast absolutely love it.
Circle Divine is one of those rare albums that is earcatchingly good at the start and still gets better and better as you play it again and again and again and again. There is nothing more here I can say, that I didn’t already said in the review, so here is the link, enjoy the read, and enjoy listening to this amazing band.

It took the new The Moon and the Nightspirits‘ record a while before it reached my CD player. Already released in June of this year it almost got lost in the stream of releases that were coming out this fall.
Almost but not quite, and that is a good thing because Aether swept me off my feet from the very first note I heard. This is the best album I’ve heard this year. and that with stiff competition from bands like M’anam, Jyoti Verhoeff, Priscilla Hernandez, Rachel Croft, Grumpy O sheep, Gói, and Irdorath. (what a musical year it has been.)
With Aether, The Moon and the Nightspirit wanted to add a certain ‘masculinity’ into their sound and the result is a gothic/medieval pagan folk CD that just blew me away. Now you could follow the link and have a read what I find so special about this new album – (and it would be highly appreciated by yours truly) – but really, if you love the music of Dead Can Dance, Shireen, Cranes, and of course The Moon and the Nightspirit themselves, don’t be bothered; just buy the record; put it on; get yourself a headphone; a chair; and vanish in this beautiful masterpiece.

Only 6 months after calling a temporary halt of activity, Finvarra returns with a beautiful Christmas album. Only available as a digital download; Lutesongs for Christmas is a lovely EP filled with traditional Christmas songs. The songs are played on old antique instruments, Lutes, harpsichord, pump organ, baroque guitar, but connect with a modern audience as only Finvarra can.
‘We wanted to give our fans a warm embrace of comforting Christmas music.‘ According to Patrick Broekema. ‘For us the ultimate Christmas music was made in the Renaissance period. They made lovely songs accompanied by lute, but also beautiful Christmas carols sang by choirs. We wanted to take those songs and make a romantic, slightly classical album that still is 100% Finvarra.‘

Did the band achieve that? Only one way to find out. Buy the album yourself, or follow the link and read all about this wonderful new Finvarra album: Lutesongs for Christmas.

The holidays are coming and with it, a stream of folk albums are coming out, including two lovely Christmas records. The first one is called Wassail, Wassail! and is recorded by Imbue.
Last year Imbue were asked to perform at a Dickens Christmas Fair, and the experience led them to venture out of their normal medieval/Renassaince repertoire, into the magical sounds of Victorian Christmas Carols. And what a treat Wassail Wassail! has become. The perfect gift to put under the Christmas Tree, or better yet, in it as the old Victorians did. In the tree? Yes, up till then the idea of giving gifts to each other was something you did on New Year, but in Victorian times it shifted towards Christmas, small gifts were hung in the tree; which was further decorated with dried fruit, candies in wrappers, cookies, nuts, strands of popcorn or cranberries and the odd tin and leather Christmas decoration.
Well, as we see it Wassail, Wassail! would be the perfect Christmas decoration/present, but of course you COULD go Victorian all the way, in which case you would hire in the Carol singers themselves and give them Wassail punch! it is ALL up to you. So here is that all-important link to read all about Wassail, Wassail! And furthermore? Merry Christmas!