Album Review: Ian Bailey - Tower Songs (Northern Sun)

Beautifully packaged atmospheric third album on Northern Sun Recordings by Lancashire-based singer-songwriter Ian Bailey, whose thoughtful compositions offer the sort of dreamy escapism that allows us to forget the world temporarily. Comprising of songs written in the idyllic setting of Lindeth Tower in Silverdale on the North Lancashire coastline, which boldly features in the moody sepia cover shot, Bailey and co-producer Gary Hall create a broody soundscape for the songs to reside. Contemplations on love, loss and mourning sit well alongside the more optimistic themes of starting afresh.

If the gorgeous Anywhere and the evocative Port in a Storm, with Richard Curran's weeping violin accompaniment, sets the atmosphere for the rest of the album, then the simplistic two guitar arrangement on I Long to Write Her a Love Song provides the album with its heart, helped in no small measure by Dan Wilde's intuitive accompaniment. Curran's string arrangements on the piano led Remember, the Spanish influenced La Puerta guitar piece and the climatic opus that is Saving Grace, gives the album the same sort of atmosphere that Robert Kirby brought to some of Nick Drake's best loved work. I'm not sure why Ian decided to leave in the count-in at the beginning of Saving Grace, the album's optimistic finisher, which embodies shades of Pachelbel's Canon and culminates in a rich and uplifting choral conclusion. There is probably a good reason. 

Like Elizabeth Gaskell before him, who also retreated to this peaceful area of North Lancashire in order to write her books, Ian Bailey likewise finds the setting particularly conducive to song writing and has created an emotive and accomplished piece of work.

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	Ian Bailey tower songs Northern Sun Recordings 2010-06-22