aaamusic | On 21, Mar 2015

Out now, Tomorrow Will Follow Today is a beautifully eclectic album by husband and wife folk duo Kathryn Roberts and Sean Lakeman.

Voted ‘Best Duo’ in the 2013 BBC Folk Awards and having released their first album in almost a decade in 2012 (Hidden People), Tomorrow Will Follow Today is a confident blend of eight own compositions and two reworked traditional songs, the first of which is from the Child Ballad collection; ‘Child Owlet’. The album was recorded and produced by Lakeman himself.

Diverse in both subject matter and musical style, from lost whales to murderous fiancés, Tomorrow Will Follow Today achieves the difficult balance of conveying a coherent musical journey, but not at the expense of contrast between individual tracks. Particularly enjoyable is the constant change of character, rhythm and tempo from one song to the next. Sean Lakeman’s guitar accompaniment switches between fulfilling an assertive, percussive role to a being a sensitive foundation for Kathryn Roberts’ voice. This contrast is perhaps most noticeable between the haunting ‘Rusalka’, a story of a mermaid who dwells in a Russian river and ‘The Banishing Book’, an upbeat musical tale rife with sexual innuendo. Crossing the old with the new; the ancient modal harmonies with the blues, the duo have found a way to create a juxtaposing sound within each song. To add to this Roberts’ voice itself seems to be chameleon-esque; morphing from delicate sweetness (‘A Song To Live By’) to solid soul (‘Down, Dog!’) to meandering country (the title track, ‘Tomorrow Will Follow Today’) depending on the mood of the song.

The closing track, ‘Soft the morning sun’ is the perfect ending to this album. Its bittersweet melody has both momentum and stillness, accentuated by Lakeman’s sympathetic guitar playing and Roberts’ profound vocal lines, which have cleverly been duplicated in the piano and guitar lines at poignant moments in the song structure.

Tomorrow Will Follow Today demonstrates the duo’s musical maturity in their ability to weave interesting and memorable songs out of simple material and ideas. Their tour of the new album begins on the 27^th March in Bristol!

Heather Ryall