CD Odyssey Disc 1275: Capercaillie

Most of my music listening gets done on my bus ride to work or my walk home. However, I had a lot of errands to run on Friday and it necessitated a lot of wandering around town, allowing me to get in a full listen of this next album.

Despite it being mostly chores, I did find time to duck into the local record store, where I grabbed L7’s new album “Scatter the Rats” and another Sabaton record, “Heroes.” Both are good, but more on those when I roll them.

Disc 1275 is… Roses and Tears

Artist: Capercaillie

Year of Release: 2008

What’s up with the Cover? Children play in a water park. I assume the water is either rosewater or tears. A rosewater fountain would be some kind of mystical blessed fountain – maybe a Water Park of Youth? By contrast, a tear fountain would be a cursed water park that feeds off of any drama that children have while playing and then absorbs their psychic distress through their tears. That last type of water park should probably have a parental advisory.

How I Came to Know It: I’ve known Capercaillie since I bought one of their albums at A&B Sound (a now defunct record store) in 1989. I picked my first Capercaillie album based on it having a lot of songs in Gaelic (I was really into Scottish folk music at the time). I bought “Roses and Tears” when it came out.

How It Stacks Up:  I have nine Capercaillie albums. I would have ten but I stopped buying them after “Roses and Tears.” Not surprisingly, it comes in last place.

Ratings: 2 stars

There was a time when if I liked a band I had to own every album they released. That time has passed, allowing me to realize that “Roses and Tears” would have been a fine Capercaillie record, if only I didn’t have eight better ones.

All the elements I like are still here. Karen Matheson’s voice remains one of folk music’s great treasures. Her tone is pure and sweet, with a mysterious quality that evokes woodland faeries or Middle Earth elves. She often sings in Gaelic which means I have no idea what she’s saying, but she makes it all seem very important.

Unfortunately, the songs in English didn’t feel this way at all. “Don’t You Go” and “Soldier Boy” are songs designed to be suffused with intense emotion. The former is a mother pleading with her son not to go to war, and “Soldier Boy” is about the terrible toll war takes on those who must endure it. Whether it is the smooth production (more on that later) or Matheson’s too-perfect diction these songs didn’t affect me the way they should given the subject matter. Strangely, “Seinneam Cliu Nam Fear Ur” - another song about the sacrifices of war - was incredibly powerful, even though I had to look up a translation before I knew what it was about.

Charlie McKerron is one of my favourite fiddle players, with a Scottish style that is rough and raw. Listening to it I can see why it was Scottish folk that first weened me off of heavy metal in the eighties – it’s just heavier than Irish or American fiddle playing. I like all these styles now but having immersed myself in a Mandolin Orange album earlier in the week, it was quite an adjustment. All that sprightly bluegrass playing from Emily Franz is glorious but very different than McKerron’s clarion blasts.

The McKerron fiddle tracks are my favourite songs on “Roses and Tears” particularly the reels where he can cut loose. “The Aphrodisiac” and “Rose Cottage Reels” have him at his best, technically perfect, but still suffusing every note with emotion and import. Listening to McKerron I was tempted to set aside my decision to part with this record, and I had to keep reminding myself I have heaps of his excellence on other records already.

It is the production that most lets “Roses and Tears” down. Apart from those fiddle reels many tracks feel artificially perfect. At times it lacks that organic quality which is what makes folk music soar. It doesn’t wreck the record, but it does make me yearn for other Capercaillie records that do all the good things this one does, only better.

Best tracks: The Aphrodisiac, Seinneam Cliu Nam Fear Ur, Rose Cottage Reels

CD Odyssey Disc 829: Capercaillie

You probably came here looking for a music review, so let’s get to it!

Disc 829 is….Sidewaulk

Artist: Capercaillie

Year of Release: 1989

What’s up with the Cover? Another awkward folk cover. Based on the combination of clothing, expressions and wallpaper this one appears to have been taken in a funeral parlour’s showroom in between picking out the coffin and the floral arrangement. Most of the band appears to be staring stoically to the left, but the guy in the middle has decided to try his “dead sexy” face on the photographer. And the guy on the right? Let’s just say he dances to the beat of his own bodhran.

How I Came To Know It: I bought their album “Crosswinds” for the rather random reason of having a lot of Gaelic songs, but I got lucky. “Sidewaulk” was me buying their next release after I knew I loved the band.

How It Stacks Up:  I have nine Capercaillie albums. I love “Sidewaulk” but competition is fierce at the top and I’m going to have to put it fourth, narrowly sidling in front of “Crosswinds.”

Ratings: 4 stars

Some music just makes you feel glad to be alive, and that’s what Capercaillie’s “Sidewaulk” has always done for me. Whether the songs are somber dirges filled with loss or joyous fiddle reels shaking the boards of the dance floor, this record always leaves me feeling like my soul has been rejuvenated.

This was one of the reasons Celtic folk music first called to me back in the early nineties; it just makes you feel something.

It all begins with Karen Matheson’s voice, which is sweet like wine and strong like iron. I can’t think of anyone who sounds so powerful and pure hitting such high notes. On “Fisherman’s Dream” when Karen asks what happened to the lost dreams of the fisherman, you want to get in a boat and go help her look for them. As much as I recently heaped praise on Jimmy Rankin for his song “Fisherman’s Son,” Capercaillie leaves the Rankins in the dust.

“Iain Ghlinn’ Cuiach” (or “John of Glenn Cuiach”) is a heartbreaker, with just Matheson’s vocal and a lone piano singing the age-old tale of unrequited love. The song ends with a wish of good fortune for the very man who’s broken the singer’s heart. Here it is in Gaelic, and then a translation:

“Ged a chinn thu rium fuar

Bheil thu, Iain, gun truas 's mi 'm chàs

'S a liuthad là agus chuir

Thu 'n céill gum bu bhuan do ghràdh?

Ach ma chaochail mi bhuaidh

'S gun so choisinn mi t'fhuath na t-fhearg

Tha mo bheannachd ad dhéidh

'S feuch an tagh thu dhuit fhéin nas fhèarr

“Although your feelings towards me have turned cold

Are you, John, without pity for me in my plight

When you so often declared

Your undying love for me?

But if I have changed so in character

That I have earned your hatred and anger

My blessings still go with you

And if you can, try to choose someone better”

Hmmm…on second thought this looks a lot like passive aggressive behavior. I’m pretty sure she’s suggesting John’s not going to find the grass greener on the other side of the meadow.

My favourite track is Capercaillie’s cover of Dick Gaughan’s 1979 song “Both Sides the Tweed.” Despite being a song about the betrayal of Scotland in its union with England, the song urges peace between the countries, even as it calls for independence:

“What's the spring-breathing jasmine and rose,

What's the summer, with all its gay train,

What's the splendor of autumn, to those

Who've barter'd their freedom for gain?

“Let the love of our land's sacred rights,

To the love or our people succeed;

Let friendship and honour unite,

And flourish on both sides the Tweed.”

That is some pretty poetry and Matheson’s vocals (accentuated artfully by Marc Duff’s recorder) further underscore almost three hundred years of Scottish soul searching.

The album has some amazing instrumentals, each featuring the brilliant Charlie McKerron on fiddle. I’ve never heard a better folk fiddler than McKerron and “Sidewaulk” has some of his finest work including “Balindore” and “The Turnpike” both of which are medleys that mix traditional Scottish fiddle songs with original Capercaillie compositions. The modern additions are every bit the equal of the classics and McKerron plays with his usual perfect mix of precision and passion.

This is an early Capercaillie album, and they haven’t incorporated a lot of world beats and rhythms that come on later albums. I like their later experiments, but I also admire “Sidewaulk’s” stark and honest beauty.

Best tracks:  Fisherman’s Dream, Iain Ghlinn’ Cuaich, The Turnpike, Both Sides the Tweed,

CD Odyssey Disc 779: Capercaillie

Happy long weekend! I spent my first day off getting my tattoo sleeve completed. After three sessions over four months I am glad to be done, and I’m feeling a little badass, truth be told.

What is not as much fun is getting your elbow ditch tattooed and being unable to fully bend your arm. I had no appreciation for how often I rely on my dominant hand to fetch things and bring them to the vicinity of  my head (shampoo, toothpaste, food) until I had to use my off hand to do it. Is this what life is like for right handed people all the time?

On to the music – it took me a while to write this one. I was enjoying listening to the album so much I delayed the review.

Disc 779 is….Secret People

Artist: Capercaillie

Year of Release: 1993

What’s up with the Cover? I have no idea. Is it a mike stand? A Celtic artifact? A cinnamon bun? This cover is confusing and – even worse – unappealing. Next time just put the band standing there posing awkwardly in outdated fashions. It’s folk tradition!

How I Came To Know It: I was already a fan of Capercaillie from their previous three records. I didn’t have much money in 1993, but I found enough to buy this album when it came out.

How It Stacks Up: I have a hard time stacking up Capercaillie albums; I like each of them for different reasons. However they stack up, “Secret People” is one of the better ones. I’ll put it second or third out of the nine albums I have.

Ratings: 4 stars

Capercaillie is the gold standard I hold my Celtic folk music against, and “Secret People” is one of the reasons why.

Not content with the minor forays into a more modern sound they started on 1991’s “Delirium,” “Secret People” takes a few risks with both their sound and their fans, and it pays off at every turn.

The core of the band’s sound remains, anchored melodically by the angelic voice of Karen Matheson and the unmatched brilliance of Charlie McKerron’s fiddle.

Yes, I said unmatched. You can pick whatever fiddle player you like, but for my money there is none better than McKerron. He hits the instrument with a power that makes you think the bow is going to saw right through the neck, yet despite being both fast and furious he delivers emotional energy and precision at every turn.

Sometimes he is just a flourish to the overall experience, like the hook he plays to start off “Four Stone Walls” and other times he just takes the whole song over as he does on “The Whinney Hills Jigs.”

Matheson is vocally his equal – the greatest voice I’ve heard in folk music, and as good as anything you hear elsewhere. Some women folk singers have a sing-song quality that masks a lack of power throughout their vocal range. Not Matheson, who soars through every note low and high, dominating soft and soulful songs like “Oran” and “An Eala Ban” with the same grace that she hits the up-tempo demands of songs like “Hi Rim Bo” and “Black Fields.”

Alone, McKerron or Matheson could carry a whole band on their shoulders, but combined they are a music miracle.

On “Secret People” Capercaillie branches out and adds rock and world elements to their music. “Seice Ruaridh (Roddy’s Drum)” is a masterclass of vocal precision from Matheson starting at a measured pace and shifting gears up into the realm of the ridiculous. Two-thirds of the way through, Capercaillie adds in electric guitar. It has no business working but it is done so perfectly, and within the context of the song’s development that it is a perfect fit. “Roddy’s Drum” consistently gets me thrashing my head around to the sheer energy of it all as much as any metal song ever has.

Lyrically, half of the songs are in Gaelic. I don’t speak a word of it but it doesn’t matter. Matheson’s delivery tells you everything you need to know about the song’s emotional intent.

The songs in English are equally good. Despite a slight taint of nineties production, “Stinging Rain” is a song that is both sad and defiant. It isn’t totally clear what it is about (I suspect spousal abuse) but it doesn’t matter. When Matheson sings:

“If you think you can hold me down I beg to differ

If you think you can twist my words, I’ll sing forever”

All you really need to know is that no one is going to defeat her spirit, however they’re trying to manage it.

I’ve owned “Secret People” for over twenty years and I still put it on every chance I get (which is less than I like, since Sheila doesn’t like Capercaillie). I’ve listened to a lot of folk music, and I haven’t found many albums I like better.

Best tracks:   Four Stone Walls, The Whinney Hills Jigs, An Eala Ban (the White Swan), Seice Ruaridh (Roddy’s Drum), Stinging Rain, Oran, Black Fields

CD Odyssey Disc 503: Capercaillie

I’ve had a mostly fun weekend, although yesterday I badly pulled my quad muscle playing Ultimate.  In hindsight, it was cold, and I should’ve warmed up a bit more than I did.  I’m not getting any younger.  I’m going to take it easy this week with fingers crossed I’m ready to go next Saturday.

As for music reviews, no leg muscles are required so I’m ready to go right now.

Disc 503 is… Beautiful Wasteland

Artist: Capercaillie

Year of Release: 1997

What’s up with the Cover?  Capercaillie seated in some warm climate (likely Spain, given the liner notes).  The band is displaying an exceptionally wide range of terrible fashion decisions, from the reflective aviator sunglasses to Karen Matheson’s ill-considered footwear.  The whole scene is viewed through some sort of James Bond tracking circle, apparently composed of barf.  On the plus side the royal blue background is nice.

How I Came To Know It:  This was just me digging through Capercaillie’s library.  I bought this album fairly late, I think at the same time I bought the previous year’s release, “To The Moon” which is a far superior effort.

How It Stacks Up:  I have nine Capercaillie albums, which isn’t all of their work, but is certainly a lot of it.  “Beautiful Wasteland” is either at or near the bottom, so 8^th or 9^th.

Rating:  2 stars but almost 3

I imagine a beautiful wasteland would be stark yet inspiring; like a desert or a lonely heath.  In this context, “Beautiful Wasteland” is a poorly titled album, because it is overpopulated with extraneous sounds that inspire only intermittently.

The album is a mix of traditional Celtic arrangements, world beats (North African traditional chants) and new age production.  The band claims that the chants from Guinea form a ‘natural marriage” with their music which I think is true rhythmically, but otherwise jarring to the overall mood. 

If that is your thing, then “Beautiful Wasteland” is going to make you very happy, but if you’re looking for contemporary Celtic folk music in a more pure form (as I was) then the album is going to be maddeningly unfocused.

Fortunately, Charlie McKerron is one of the world’s finest fiddle players, and his work will always inspire.  That said he shouldn’t have to work so hard to be heard.  On “The Tree” – an updated traditional song – he manages to rise above the sort of new age mood the band surrounds his work with.  The fiddle melody in this song is awesome but I wanted to hear more of it.  The way the song is arranged it always felt like he was getting cut off before he got going.  Still, even a little Charlie is worth the price of admission.

On songs like “A Mur Gorm” the band’s other star, vocalist Karen Matheson, contends with the same challenges. The song, which translates as “The Blue Rampart,” is a beautiful mood piece but it needs a little more wasteland to be perfect.  It has too many odd piano flourishes or strangely placed bits of flute whimsy.  Some of this would be OK (anyone who has heard overly didactic folk music will know that you can go just as badly wrong in the other direction).  I would have done just a little less if I’d been in the studio with them.

The lyrics to “A Mur Gorm” are beautiful and awkward in that way translations can sometimes be.  Here are the first two verses, first in Gaelic.  FYI, the Cuillins are a series of mountains on the Isle of Skye:

“Mur b'e thusa bhiodh an Cuilithionn

'Na mhur eagarra gorm

Ag crioslachadh le bhalla-criche

Na tha 'nam chridhe borb

“Mur b'e thusa bhiodh a'ghaineamh

Tha'n Talasgar dumhail geal

'Na clar biothbuan do mo dhuilean

Air nach tilleadh an run-ghath”

And then translated:

“But for you the Cuillin would be

An exact and serrated blue rampart

Girdling with its march-wall

All that is in my barbarous heart

“But for you the sand

That is in Talisker, compact and white

Would be a measureless plain to my expectations

And on it the spear desire would not turn back”

Now this is how you do romance.  Also, while Talisker is no doubt a place, it is also a Scotch.  If I was pining for my anxious and yearning lover to scale some mountain peaks with a spear of desire, it would be great to have some single malt while I waited.

Less enjoyable is “Shelter,” which is apparently about some more modern societal malaise but it is hard to figure out exactly what it is about.  Also I found the mixed metaphor in the chorus to be distracting:

“This ain’t no ark of Noah

No mockery of history

A taxi ride to nowhere

Just a drifting boat at sea.”

If you’re going to go with the Noah’s ark/drifting boat analogy I wish you all the best, but don’t confuse it with a taxi ride to nowhere, which is quite a different thing thematically.  The song itself seems equally forced, with a chord progression that I think is designed to make you feel uneasy but just comes across as awkward.

Not so “Hebridean Halle-Bopp” which takes its inspiration from the passage of the comet Halle-Bopp the year “Beautiful Wasteland” came out.  While I have no idea what the lyrics are about, the tune captures the energy and cosmic connectedness of the event.

The album ends on a high note, with “Sardinia” a song written by McKerron that has a gorgeous ear-worm of a fiddle reel within it.  At this stage of their careers Capercaillie will never settle for just a fine fiddle reel, and there are more new age production elements thrown in as well.  Here they work, tastefully serving the song and letting the fiddle cut across the top, like it is designed to do.

Overall this record is uneven and in places strained.  At 56 minutes of playing time, I think it might have benefited from cutting a couple of the lesser tracks.  That said, it has moments of greatness and even a lesser Capercaillie album is better than most of the contemporary folk music out there right now.  I won’t be selling this album, even though I’ll likely be continuing to give my other Capercaillie albums more time in the rotation.

Best tracks:  M’Ionam, The Tree, Am Mur Gorm, Hebridean Halle-Bopp, Sardinia

CD Odyssey Disc 419: Capercaillie

It has been a busy day of work, errands, and volunteer activities, all on very little sleep.  In all the recent excitement on these fronts I’ve missed four workouts in the past two weeks as well, and that’s not sitting well with me either.

That said I’m finally sitting where I want to be – in the writer’s chair.  It may not be the next chapter of my novel, but it is writing for pleasure about a topic I love, music.  And today’s sub-genre of that love will be folk music.

Disc 419 is…Choice Language

Artist: Capercaillie

Year of Release: 2003

What’s up with the Cover?  A child’s hand grasps some kind of tall grass that I can’t identify, with some random words floating up in the bottom of the shot.  This cover is attractive enough, but nothing to write home about.

How I Came To Know It: I’ve been a fan of Capercaillie since the late eighties, when I first discovered them.  “Choice Language” is just me drilling through their collection, although when this album came out I somehow missed it, and so didn’t buy it until about five years later.  I think the band has only had two albums in the past ten years or so, so their output has slowed quite a bit, although I haven’t done any post-modern research about their lives that allows me to comment on why.  I only know I miss them.

How It Stacks Up:  I have nine Capercaillie albums, which is most of them.  “Choice Language” is not my favourite, but it holds its own.  I’ll say it is around 7^th or 8^th best, but competition is stiff.

Rating:  3 stars, but close to 4

Even though “Choice Language” isn’t an album I put on a lot, it is another strong entry, in the discography of the band I consider to embody the best of pure Celtic folk music, Capercaillie.

As with all of their albums, “Choice Language” gets its core from Karen Matheson’s exceptional vocals, pure as a highland stream, and Charlie McKerron’s fiddle, as complex and brazen as a high end Scotch.

Matheson’s voice shows no signs of flagging with age, and on songs like “Little Do They Know” and “Who Will Raise Their Voice?” she is able to lift lyrics that in lesser hands might have sounded clunky and trite.

Instead, these potentially schlocky songs are two of my favourites.  Still, neither one matches the beauty of the even more traditional “I Will Set My Ship in Order,” a classic ballad of ill-fated love.  The song tells the story of a sailor who comes to the casement window of his love, and says that if her father and mother will allow it, he would marry her right then and there, but he needs her answer right away.

In a lot of these Gaelic songs (and there are a lot of these) the man pines away for the girl he cannot have, with various tragic consequences.  Sometimes someone gets shot or stabbed, or the lovers run away together and something equally awful results.  This one took a surprising turn when the man, denied at the window leaves immediately.  His love changes her mind almost immediately, but before she can even get to the door to let him in, he’s already gone.

I couldn’t help but think this guy gave up pretty easily, although the whole ‘inconstant sailor’ is also a pretty common folk song thing as well, I suppose.  Seeing him gone, the maid decides to push the bounds of over-reaction, even for folk music:

"Come back, come back, my ain dear Johnny

Come back, come back and marry me"

"How can I come back and marry you, love?

Our ship is sailing on the sea"

"The fish may fly, and the seas run dry

The rocks may melt doon wi' the sun

And the working man may forget his labor

Before that my love returns again

"She's turned herself right roun' about

She's flung herself intae the sea

Farewell for aye, my ain dear Johnny

Ye'll ne'er hae tae come back to me"

I guess it just goes to show that in Celtic folk music if someone loves someone else, they better get it sorted out quickly, because one way or another tragedy is going to strike pretty damned quickly otherwise.

Impressively, Matheson’s vocals are so pure that they make you think this sort of youthful exuberance/idiocy is actually not only reasonable, but inescapable.  But it isn’t just the vocals; she’s aided in her task by the understated plucking of Manus Lunny on guitar, McKerron’s genius on fiddle and some whistle instrument of indeterminate nature (hey, I’m an amateur) by Michael McGoldrick.

“I Will Set My Ship in Order” is timeless folk music that will not just sound fresh in twenty years, but in two hundred years as well.

Equally beautiful is the Gaelic song, “Nuair A Chì Thu Caileag Bhòidheach” or translated, “Whenever You See a Pretty Girl,” which is a sparsely arranged and touching song that (when translated) would be good advice for the couple in “I Will Set My Ship in Order”:

“Ach innse mi mar ghaol na h-òige (But I shall tell you of the love of the young)

Mura bheil mo chòmhradh meallt (Unless I'm mistaken)

Théid e seachad mar na sgòthan (It passes like the clouds)

'S mar na neòil tha os ar cionn (And the stars above)”

You see, window jumpers, there are other options out there.

Sadly, not all the tracks on “Choice Language” achieve the same high standard of these two.  They are generally good, but there are some production decisions I can do without, particularly the sort of smooth jazz aesthetic that is present in the background of some songs.  This kind of over-relaxed noodling occasionally takes away from Capercaillie’s efforts to create a more atmospheric Pink Floyd feel, and pushes the music painfully close to easy listening.  This is particularly painful in “Homer’s Reel” which has some amazing fiddle playing that is ill paired with jazzy piano that is entirely out of place on the record, or at least it should be.

It doesn’t happen often on “Choice Language”, which is generally excellent throughout, but it does happen enough to push the album down to three stars where it could’ve easily been four, given everything else it has going for it.

Best tracks:  Little Do They Know, The Sound of Sleat/The Fear/Dans Plinn, Nuair A Chì Thu Caileag Bhòidheach (Whenever You See a Pretty Girl), I Will Set My Ship in Order.

CD Odyssey Disc 330: Capercaillie

Warning rock and roll purists, the next review is a folk music review. On the plus side, this band is worth your time and then some.

Disc 330 is...Crosswinds

Artist: Capercaillie

Year of Release: 1987

What’s Up With The Cover?: This is how I like my folk album covers: simple and idyllic. Here we have an old school fishing harbour, likely in some Scottish firth. I have a soft spot for the Age of Sail, and while I prefer big ships-of-the-line in full sail against rough seas, I'll settle for a quiet fishing village, as long as there are some masts in it.

How I Came To Know It: As I've noted a few times on the Odyssey, in the late eighties and early nineties, I was very into Celtic folk music. Early on I didn't have many guideposts on how to discover new artists; they aren't played on the radio (or at least any station I was familiar with) and I knew next to no one who shared my passion. I found myself in A&B sound one day looking in the Scottish portion of the "world" section.

Not knowing what I was doing, I picked a band that had a lot of songs with Gaelic titles, and seemed to be prominent on the shelves. It turned out to be Capercaillie's "Crosswinds". My choice would result in a twenty year love affair with the band that continues to this day. That said, I do not recommend finding artists this way - you'd have better luck winning at roulette in Vegas.

How It Stacks Up: I have nine Capercaillie albums. "Crosswinds" I've had the longest, and still holds up well under stiff competition. I'd say it is between 3rd and 5th, depending on what part of the band's career I'm most into at any given moment (they change styles a fair bit along the journey).

Rating: 4 stars and almost 5. That's right - 4 stars for an album that is potentially as low as 5th best in the collection. You read that right, jerky.

We writers tend to wax poetic on topics, often overstating an argument just for the pure wordsmithery of the experience. So when I say that Capercaillie is my favourite Celtic folk band of all time, let me assure you that this is not one of those times.

Capercaillie is the best Celtic folk band I have ever heard. The fact that I found them basically by accident because of little more than an aesthetically pleasing cover and their propensity for using Gaelic in their song titles sorely tests my firmly held believe in a random universe.

At the time I wanted as 'authentic' a Celtic folk experience as I could get. Like lovers of heavy metal need to hear ever-heavier music, or lovers of jazz must have increasingly complex song constructions, lovers of folk look for increasingly 'real' folk experiences, characterized by artists that can cleave as close as possible to an art form hundreds of years old and still come off sounding fresh.

That is "Crosswinds" summarized. It is Capercaillie's second album released (I regret to admit I do not yet have their first, but it is on my list), and their sound is still solidly traditional in every sense. However, this band is living proof that traditional doesn't have to be boring. When it is delivered with the skill and emotional resonance as these guys are capable of, it makes you sit up and take notice.

That is not to say it is for everyone. If you don't like folk music, you certainly won't like this, where the hooks to pop sensibilities are few and far between. It also isn't for casual listening while someone talks over it; the fiddle reels will just sound annoying and shrill if you don't open your heart to them.

If you do open your heart to them, you will catch some beautiful melodies that rival or surpass anything in mainstream music. You will also be priviliged to hear the unsurpassed talent of Mr. Charlie McKerron on fiddle.

Granted, there are stylistic differences between different fiddles; fiddlers from Ireland, Cape Breton and the United States all have their own sounds that make them hard to compare. However, if you twist my rubber arm, I will tell you that Charlie McKerron is not only the finest player of the Scottish fiddle, he is the finest of them all.

The fiddle playing on "Crosswinds" taught me to appreciate the instrument in a way I had never done before. McKerron has the ability to play the same lines of a reel, note for note three or four times in succession, and yet somehow these notes will strike the ear each time in a way that makes you feel the song is progressing higher and higher. Listening is like watching a bird circling ever higher in the sky, cutting its flight with a song that lifts you on its wings and elevates your entire soul.

"Crosswinds" is replete with examples, including "The Haggis" where he comes in as accompaniment to the excellent recorder playing of Marc Duff, or where he takes matters fully into his own hands from the beginning on "Brenda Stubbert's Set" and "David Glen's" (fiddle reels tend to be named after someone). His playing can be soulful and low, or it can be frenetic, but he never misses, always taking you forward through the progressions seamlessly, right on each beat, and yet simultaneously slipping your mind ahead to the next without ever slipping. He does this even in the must furiously fast portions of a song. It is hard to describe, but very easy to listen to.

As if Charlie and Marc aren't enough, Capercaillie also boasts one of the greatest folk vocalists of our time; Karen Matheson. I would argue she is the best, with tones that rival an opera singer in their purity and power, without ever losing the human tones around the edge of each note so important for the human connection in folk music.

You may know her as the woman who sings the mournful dirge in the campfire scene in Rob Roy, but "Crosswinds" was my first encounter with her. In later albums, she sings songs in both Gaelic and English, but in this early effort all the singing is in Gaelic. The preservation of Gaelic has long been a passion of the band, in fact.

The first song on the record is a traditional Scottish "puirt a beul" which means roughly 'mouth music' where the words are secondary to the lilting quality of the vocals. In fact, in some places 'puirt a beul' can mean the words are actually just nonesense words, like scatting in jazz singing. The song is "Puirt A Beul/Snug In a Blanket". I have no idea what it is about (maybe nothing) but it makes me feel snug in a blanket on a winter's day.

Later on the record Matheson will sing songs that definitely tell a story, including the beautiful and haunting "Am Buachaille Ban." Not speaking Gaelic, until tonight I didn't know what it is about, but the song is so beautiful I can never help but be overwhelmed by the emotion of it when I hear it. More often than not, such songs are about some type of lost love. Through the power of google you can actually read an English translation right here. Sure enough - lost love, and a depressing one at that.

Equally beautiful is the equally incomprehensible (to me) "Urnaigh A'Bhan-Thigreach", another song that is translated here at my new favourite site, http://www.celticlyricscorner.net/. This time the song is about a woman praying to God for rain to end a drought before it claims her child. Not exactly uplifting stuff. Even without having the translation, Matheson's voice lets you know that something terrible is happening. She draws you into understanding with just her emotional delivery.

It is ironic that I discovered Capercaillie through a desire to have a very pure folk experience, and later they would become my principal gateway into other branches of folk music. In later records they would incorporate the sounds and arrangements of other cultures, as well as more modern pop musical structures, each time seamlessly blending them into the traditional sounds I first fell in love with on "Crosswinds". But those evolutions in their music I'll talk about when I review later albums.

Suffice it to say that in searching for a real Celtic experience I not only found its pinnacle, I also found a guide that would lead me into other aspects of this rich and under-appreciated genre of music for years to come.

Best tracks: Puirt A Beul/Snug In a Blanket, Am Buchaille Ban, The Haggis, Brenda Stubbert's Set, Urnaigh A'Bhan-Thigreach, My Laggan Love/Fox On The Town