Birdengine -‘The Crooked Mile’ (Bleeding Heart Recordings)

Birdengine is the name that one Lawry Joseph Tilbury works under. Having previously released two EPs for the highly regarded (and now defunct) Scottish label Benbecula, he now releases his debut album on Bleeding Heart Recordings.

It’s now mid-October, and at this point in the year, I’ve heard getting onto three hundred new releases this year. And let me say, that with all sincerity, this is up there in the top 5 of the best I have heard this year.

Tilbury’s style is, right from the first listen, conducive to producing an album which is dark, exploratory and intrguing, right from the off. Puzzled by the first two tracks on the first play, by the third ‘No arms and no friends’ I was getting swept into it. By the end of the album, I had to go back and play it a couple more times because it had bewitched me, in the best possible sense.

Blessed with a strangely soothing bass-baritone voice, this debut might well come under the ‘freak folktronica’ if that’s the label you want to bandy about. Personally, it’s just great to hear a record that’s acoustic fight off cliche and produce something that genuinely stands alone.

Get your hands on a copy of this album. Because I won’t be letting go of my copy. And you won’t want to lose your copy either, if you have any sense.

****1/2

The Crooked Mile is released on Bleeding Heart Recordings on October 2011.