The surprising thing about Eilidh Shaw and Ross Martin’s first album together isn’t so much that it took them 15 years of living and playing together to get round to recording it as that they travelled over to the studio at Sabhal Mor Ostaig on Skye to do so.
The result of these daily trips gives every impression that they might have got the fire on in their kitchen in Morar and set a tape running instead, so homely and comfortable with each other do Shaw’s fiddle and voice and Martin’s guitar sound.
Long years with folk groups the Poozies and Daimh respectively have given their playing character and the mostly instrumental tracks variously swing, march, reel and waltz with a conversational air as Martin provides the relaxed energy that probes Shaw’s unadorned phrasing and attention to the melody.
Shaw’s song The Lines of Time, although written about an older couple, emphasises this pair’s feeling of easy togetherness and while most of the material is Highland in origin, Are You Lonesome Tonight and Can’t Help Falling in Love’s appropriation as a Gaelic waltz medley and Shaw’s soft intoning of Bruce Springsteen’s Dancing in the Dark somehow add to the Highland charm.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here