Pearl Street Raga [Digipak]

The debut album by Bristol indie folk outfit Babel fits nicely next to contemporaries like Midlake and the Decemberists without sounding too similar to any of them. Indeed, this largely acoustic quintet tends to look backwards for their inspirations. The glorious title track, with its stomping beat (quite literally: Daisy Palmer's drums and percussion are present and accounted for, but singer-guitarist Daniel Coughlan's foot is the main thing keeping time) and Indian-influenced guitar lines, sounds inspired by the same Davy Graham and Bert Jansch records that Jimmy Page later shamelessly plagiarized. Elsewhere, the likes of Fairport Convention, cult U.K. folk fave Nic Jones, and hints of American country and alt country crop up. Highlights include the simply lovely, hushed country waltz "Shangri-La" (with its elegant, Richard Thompson-like electric guitar solo by Rick Brown) and "Rain," which features a double-time acoustic guitar track above a more measured rhythm section, a lovely Gypsy-like violin part by Martin Lanchester (the band's secret weapon throughout the album) and a dramatic Roy Orbison-style lead vocal by Coughlan that gives an otherwise low-key song a gospel-like sense of vibrancy and power. Enchanting from start to finish, Pearl Street Raga is a most promising debut with appeal both to the indie alt folk crowd and old-school folk-rock fans. ~ Stewart Mason|