Reviewed by Tony Cummings

If like me you welcome the Back To Acoustic movement but are not a fully-fledged hey-nonny-no you will have been waiting for a band like Eden Burning who bring a rock music dynamic to mandolins, harmonicas, accordions and (even) bouzoukis. But it's not just the dexterity of the band that catches the ear, though multi-instrumentalist Neil does play some dazzling stuff while the rhythm section is nice and beefy. It's the songs, fluid lyrics which are poetic but never twee with lyrics which speak volumes of spiritual truth. Finally there are the haunting melodies with Paul's vocals at times sounding eerily like the Waterboys, which fit perfectly. This is a magnificent album revealing new things with every play, and when one considers that it was recorded privately on a minuscule budget one needs to give the band, engineer David Pick, and the whole Christian Acoustic Rock movement a hearty round of applause. Now go buy it.


Also reviewed in CR7:
If you didn't catch 'em at Harry '91, make sure you get to the Cross Rhythms fest or Greenbelt. For this superlative roots band are producing some of the freshest, most spine-tingling music to come out of Christendom. Their previous album 'Thin Walls' was excel­lent though if it had a fault it was that some songs lacked those memorable hooks needed to pass the old grey-whistle-test but these 4 new ones (it's a mini-album this time: are all memorable while the arrangements with Neill Forrest's mandolin and Charlotte's bluesy harmonica are first class. Paul Northup's singing goes from strength to strength as does his lyric writing. Here he explores the call of God and Ephesians 5: 8-11 without ever resorting to cliché. Thoroughly recommended.
10
Tony Cummings

The opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those held by Cross Rhythms. Any expressed views were accurate at the time of publishing but may or may not reflect the views of the individuals concerned at a later date.

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