The Unthanks

Not many bands can count amongst their fans, Radiohead, Portishead, Robert Wyatt, Ben Folds, Elvis Costello, Damon Albarn, Ewan McGregor and Nick Hornby, but The Unthanks occupy a unique place in music. Northumbria sisters Rachel and Becky Unthank are unsentimental young storytellers outside of time, forging links between folk worlds old, new and other. Staunch traditionalism and sonic adventure ought to be polar opposites, yet they are easy bedfellows in the gentle hands of The Unthanks; the British counterpart to the leftfield folk leanings of Sufjan Stevens, Bonnie Prince Billy, Tom Waits and Fleet Foxes. Formerly known as Rachel Unthank & The Winterset, their second album The Bairns (2007) was Mercury Music Prize nominated and in The Best Albums of the Decade (worldwide, all genres) in Uncut and The Guardian. New album Here’s The Tender Coming uses a kaleidoscope of unlikely instruments and features in almost every UK poll for Albums of the Year.

“once in a blue moon type of every now and again, you hear music that is so complete, so wonderful, unique and yet familiar that it stops you in your tracks. They have that blue moon magic about them, and  they have it in spades” BBC Music

www.the-unthanks.com
www.myspace.com/rachelunthank
www.twitter.com/TheUnthanks