Rachel Unthank and The Winterset

Folk is about mythology and places we cannot go to anymore. The only way to see these places and live these legends is through the retelling of tales. And with Rachel Unthank and The Winterset, we can travel through most mysterious times and meet most interesting people, all while standing in the crowd at The Spitz.

The band are made up of two singing sisters, Rachel and Becky Unthank, Niopha Keegan on fiddle and a Bonnie Tyler loving lesbian pianist named Belinda O'Hooley. Rachel and Becky have different, but spectacular emoting voices. When they were singing, the audience were in complete silenced awe. No-one spoke or even moved in case they should frighten away this wonderful sound.

Rachel has a light voice, weaved of grassy meadow. Her singing comes easy and is as natural as clouds on a fresh moor. Becky provides the counterbalance, with the voice of wandering spirits who are not quite at peace: ghosts of damned men, criminals and drunks. The words rise through her and are torn into the air.

The set was comprised of mostly dark slow songs. Fareweel Regalite and Sea Song were hauntingly brilliant and felt like poltergeists were tickling your insides. The lyrics are filled with rum and lash. The fast songs played as light relief against the intensity, but the vigorous fiddle playing almost broke into parody at one point. Blackbird jaunted along and chased away the apparitions for a while.

In some ways, modern folk is an oxymoron and I can't see it being folk unless it's somehow rooted in the past or somewhere long gone. Perhaps modern folk (or nu-folk) is about taking the stories and spinning them anew. Rachel Unthank and The Winterset just about get away with it.