A BROKEN CONSORT (RICHARD SKELTON) - Box Of Birch

Richard Skelton's wondrous "Marking Time" was an easy inclusion in our top 10 albums of the year just a short few months ago, but we didn't immediately realise that the artist was responsible for an absolute plethora of projects conceived, realised, beautifully packaged and self-released via his own "Sustain-Release" website over the last few years. It's one of those things, you discover a new artist, get completely obsessed by their work and then discover that beyond the precious little nuggets of material you own there's actually a world of music spread out in handmade limited editions owned by a lucky few individuals prescient enough to have found them in the first place. Out of all of the bespoke editions that we managed to get our hands on, "Box Of Birch" (recorded under the 'A Broken Consort' moniker) has been the one we have been most emotionally attached to, and its with absolute delight that we greet this new edition on the ever-impressive Tompkins Square label. If you've never heard this album before, or indeed any of Richard Skelton's material, you're in for quite a treat, he makes the most intimate and enveloping sounds imaginable from the barest of ingredients - bowed strings, field recordings, piano - and very little else. Each of the four long pieces slowly evolves and changes colour, with a profoundly moving, almost mournful undertone that never ceases to affect us despite having now listened to this album more times than we could possibly remember. Treat this as a second chance to pick up one of the great unknown modern classical albums of recent times - and if you ever see anything this guy is involved with - buy on sight. Boomkat

A BROKEN CONSORT (RICHARD SKELTON) - Box Of Birch