Unholy Majesty

Continuing with the subject of Bristol-based acts another, and again one given to collaborations (notably including Jeremy Smoking Jacket, with SJ Esau), Rose Kemp follows up her 2007 album A Hand Full of Hurricanes with Unholy Majesty that is released, again by One Little Indian Records, on September 1, 2008.

Never one to stick with convention and - for older readers she is the daughter of Rick Kemp and Maddie Prior of Steeleye Span - this is unlikely to be an album that will find universal favour but could well be all the better for it. After her 2003 début Glance she laid her acoustic guitar aside in favour of one electric and, on this album, takes the progression well beyond that already evident on A Hand Full Of Hurricanes. There are folk influences on it, occasionally, but there are certainly plenty of others too; if you can handle hints of folk combined with hard and heavy riffs and experimental rock themes this is probably for you and me. She is touring the UK, mostly with the band, in September.
It is wise to remember that this label, while it is not perhaps a household name, is certainly no stranger to someone who is. If there is a unconventional chanteuse, vicariously known to millions not only for her musical boundary-pushing, that is surely 'One Little Indian' recording artist Björk!

You have been warned.