June Tabor Albums (16)
What The Critics Say
New June Tabor albums don't grow on trees (unlike the proverbial apples of the title). But, in different ways, each has proved well worth the wait, and this is no exception. Tabor has long been thought of as a merchant of unrelieved doom and gloom, and there's no denying that a number of her albums are full of shadowed material -- it's something in which she excels as a leading interpreter of traditional and contemporary songs. Yet this time out there's a lighter touch to the proceedings, thanks to Andy Cutting and his melodeon. "The Dancing," which opens the disc, shows him as a perfectly, sprightly foil for Tabor's autumnal voice. But it's still on the darker, heavier stuff that she truly excels, as with "Standing in Line" or "The Rigs of Rye." Perhaps because they're thrown into sharper relief by showing a variety of moods, her singing has rarely seemed so majestic, and she's not afraid to show it on the spare "Speak Easy." With the balance she's achieved here, Tabor has made a superb record. ~ Chris Nickson, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
You always know a June Tabor album means quality, thoughtful performances, interesting material, and wonderful arrangements -- along with that spellbinding, velvet autumn voice. For this disc she's assembled her dream team of musicians -- her usual accompanists plus Martin Simpson, Andy Cutting, and a couple of others -- to play on a fascinating collection of songs. The emphasis is on the traditional, but she hardly confines herself to pieces like "The Banks of the Sweet Primeroses," but also pieces by contemporary writers, and the jazz standard "Do Nothing 'til You Hear from Me," which is the only piece that doesn't quite work. By itself it's fine, but set alongside the relative sobriety of the folk material, its tone seems to jar a little (at the same time, her version of "Heart Like a Wheel" flows with an elegant grace). She seems most at home on the folk songs -- modern or old -- bringing a sly sense of humor to "The Broomfield Wager," for example, and a real ache to "Oh! Alas I Am in Love." As her recent box set showed, she's one of Britain's great singers, developing over the years, and this really does show her at the height of her powers, with a majestic control, and flawless backing. This stands as one of her very best albums -- which is high praise indeed. ~ Chris Nickson, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Listening to this, it's easy to believe that June Tabor was made to sing these old border ballads, tales of the uneasy coexistence of families in the marches between England and Scotland. Her dark voice is well-suited to the texts, which are often bloody and vengeful, and quite certainly epic -- in some respects, the very essence of British balladry, whether it's "The Battle of Otterburn," with its gloriously textured Kathryn Tickell arrangement, or the demanding "The Duke of Athole's Nurse," where Martin Simpson is reunited with Tabor, his guitar offering shining counterpoint to her voice. The songs, tried and tested over the centuries, are wonderful in themselves, but Tabor's presentation of them brings them fully to life, like "The Cruel Mother." Harrowing at the best of times, it becomes pure torment in her hands. And her "Sir Patrick Spens" makes the old Fairport Convention version sound like a playground romp. Intensity has always been one of Tabor's fortes, and here she takes full advantage of the opportunity to indulge it. While she's very good with other material, Tabor never sounds more at home than with traditional music, and on these ballads, in particular, she seems as if she's come home. A stunning jewel in a remarkable career, and one of the best things Tabor's ever released. ~ Chris Nickson, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
On this album, June Tabor continues to explore the no man's land that lies between art song and traditional ballad, veering first in one direction and then the other, with results that, while ultimately mixed, never fail to hold one's attention. The program this time out is thematically unified; each song has to do with roses, especially with the rose as a symbol -- of love (both divine and profane), beauty, and hope. As usual, her sources are primarily traditional, but also as usual, the non-traditional sources can be surprising -- a Tchaikovsky song, a Les Barker tune, a sentimental British World War I music hall song. And also as usual, she shines brightest on the least-arty material. Her delivery is sensitive and masterful on Les Barker's "Maybe Then I'll Be a Rose" and the Tchaikovsky adaptation, but it's the Robert Burns setting ("My Love Is Like a Red, Red Rose") and her exquisitely delicate rendition of "Es Ist ein Rose Ersprungen" (here titled "Rhosyn Wyn/Winterrose") that send chills up the spine. Overall, this is not an album that stands head and shoulders above the rest of Tabor's work, but bear in mind that Tabor's work tends to stand head and shoulders above the competition. ~ Rick Anderson, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
As June Tabor ages her voice seems, paradoxically, to become clearer and sharper. She is also becoming increasingly interested in expanding her repertoire beyond the traditional British and Irish folk music on which her early career was built. There are no fiddles or guitars on this album; instead there are Huw Warren's piano and the Creative Jazz Orchestra, a big band complete with French horn and two trombones. So has she finally crossed the line that separates a mere singer from a chanteuse? Not yet, thankfully. While one of these songs does come from a musical, a plurality of them (including such standbys as "The Water Is Wide" and "I Will Put My Ship in Order") are traditional, and there are two Richard Thompson covers ("Waltzing's for Dreamers" and "Pharaoh") and a fine version of Ewan MacColl's immortal "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face." The big-band arrangements are surprisingly effective, especially on the Maggie Holland composition "A Place Called England" and on the dour "Pharaoh." Not everyone will prefer this album to her earlier work, but Tabor herself has never sounded better. ~ Rick Anderson, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
June Tabor opens her latest album with a bang, delivering what may be the final definitive version of Richard Thompson's "The Great Valerio" -- perhaps the first performance to rival Linda Thompson's. Though it is marred slightly by her longstanding tendency to get all clenched and growly at predictable points in the narrative ("He Fades Away" and "No Man's Land" from her earlier albums), that bone-chilling hymn of disillusionment has never had a more affecting delivery than this one. From there she moves into the gentle and heartbreaking traditional ballad "I Wonder Where My True Love Is Tonight," and she's off and running through a minefield of emotion, from the draining Holocaust song "Di Nakht" to such folkier fare as "The Fiddler" and "Go from My Window." Tabor's accompaniment is worth noting. In recent years it has become much artier, focusing more on piano and winds than on fiddle and guitar. And at times the art-song approach sounds overdone -- "No Good at Love" sounds jarringly like secondhand Kurt Weill. But it can also work well, as on the delicate "Go from My Window." "April Morning," in which she sings "O if I had but my own heart back again/Safe in my bosom I would lock it up forever," is accompanied by nothing more than a little piano and a dab of viola, leaving her sturdy, dark voice to run the whole show. It's a marvelous moment, one of many on this stunning record. ~ Rick Anderson, All Music Guide
'Singing the Storm'
Release Date 7/2/1996
Tracks 12
Label Cooking Vinyl
See Album Tracklist and Review
'Against the Streams'
Release Date 11/15/1994
Tracks 11
Label Green Linnet
See Album Tracklist and Review
What The Critics Say
This addition to June Tabor's catalog reveals a woman exploring new aspects of her considerable talent while still feeding the roots of the folk tradition in which she grew up. A piano and concertina accompaniment provides a stark, dry background to Tabor's voice on "Shameless Love," the album's opening track, and on this song you hear her moving a little bit away from the traditionalism which has dominated so much of her work in the past. "I Want to Vanish," a song penned for Tabor by Elvis Costello, moves her even farther afield -- it almost sounds like a turn of the century parlor song. But the next three tracks find her on more familiar terrain: the traditional "False, False" and Richard Thompson's typically cynical and lovely "Pavanne" both sound like they were written for Tabor's rich alto voice, and "He Fades Away" is an emotionally devastating meditation in the voice of an Australian woman watching her husband die from the effects of asbestos mining -- "He fades away," she says, "not like the leaves of autumn turning gold against the grey," but rather "like the bloodstains on his pillowcase that I wash every day." If you can remain unmoved through this song, then you need to have your pulse checked. "Beauty and the Beast: An Anniversary" is an awkward spoken word interlude, but "Waiting for the Lark," the tender lullaby that closes the album, is a gorgeous counterweight to "He Fades Away." This is one of Tabor's finest efforts. ~ Rick Anderson, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
There are those who consider this the best of Tabor's later recordings. And it is excellent, but for those new to her, this is even more stark and harrowing than usual. Still, it's a triumph of form and content, and her voice, now maturing into a richer, deeper, lower register, has become (if possible) a more formidable instrument than before. ~ John Dougan, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
June Tabor is one of the finest folk singers alive. Not only is she completely in command of a vast repertoire of traditional British and Irish songs, but she has also shown herself able to move completely out of that repertoire (into, for example, Yiddish and Civil War songs) without any loss of authority. Not everything she does succeeds entirely, but there are singers who would kill to be able to do at their best what she does when she's just phoning it in. That said, Abyssinians is not her best album. Although it starts off strong with the almost a cappella "Month of January," things quickly bog down: where "The Month of January" is gorgeous and depressing, "The Scarecrow" is merely depressing. And is that glass harmonica in the background? Good grief. (The lack of musician credits on the CD is an irritant.) "A Smiling Shore" is the heartbreakingly effective tale of a Holocaust survivor; "Lay This Body Down" is a Civil War-era spiritual which she delivers in a surprisingly effective voice. Most of the rest is mediocre for her, but again, that's not even close to half bad. ~ Rick Anderson, All Music Guide
