Alison Cotton - Only Darkness Now

Format: Silver Vinyl
Catalogue No.: FRLPR003
Barcode: 5051083170246
Release Date: 3 Nov 2021
Genre: Folk/Americana

Sounds like: Max Richter. Tony Conrad. The Unthanks. Laura Cannell.

With gliding viola & choral forces, Only Darkness Now is a more alive, peopled landscape than its predecessor. Moods remain contemplative, concerned with vivid, historical netherworlds & torments – we see this in extended album centrepiece 'Behind the Spiderweb Gate' and in 'In Solitude I Will Fade Away'. However despite its title Only Darkness now has a brighter expanse: Cotton layers viola, chimes & Omnichord - an electrical ghost-like medieval drone, alongside percussion, harmonium, piano & voice. This is a confident record, lifting Shirt of Lace by medieval revivalist Dorothy Carter, from Celtic lament to cathedral like grandeur.
Original cassette release on Bloxham Tapes and limited vinyl pressing by Cardinal Fuzz sold out instantly with little press. Coloured vinyl & altered artwork by Luke Drozd

Radio - *Late Junction, Elizabeth Alker's Unclassified & Gideon Coe

Online - *Number 11 - The Quietus Top 100 Albums of 2020 – voted unanimously by every writer.
Number 1- The Quietus New Weird Britain End of Year List Stewart Lee’s Cultural Year 2020 – 4****5***** (Record Collector)

Tracklisting
Behind the Spiderweb Gates
In Solitude I Will Fade Away
How My Heart Bled in Bleeding Heart Yard
The Hill Was Hollow
Shirt Of Lace