The latest record from Laura Cannell is a reminder to blink hard and look up at the sky, writes Kirsteen McNish.

‘All that matters is that we pause to remember where we are, and what we need to change in order to continue, through the standstill of solstice, into a new spring’ – John Burnside

I have taken myself off to a place where there is just the sea and seemingly no sign of Yuletide festivities for a week of isolation and words, so listening to this album is my first toe-dip into the blurry time of winter traditions, sat listening on a cliffside, before I make the journey back home. Winter can bring up so many variable shades within us. Wrapping ourselves against the cold, the light when it appears shines brighter, we feel our footsteps more, we feel loss and familiar connection more keenly. The spaces in between sing and swell.

This is a collection of Cannell’s journeys. On the dizzyingly evocative ‘Bleak Midwinter’ we can hear the geese and rushing of the wind from the North Norfolk coast over flat marsh and fenland. I am reminded of John Burnside’s poem ‘History’ in ‘A Midnight Moonlight Clearing’; of stillness and of watching in the eye of a storm.  The track ‘Lost in A Merry Christmas’ feels like the unpredictable swirling weather and the ripples of people gathering in pools and dispersing again. A clearness too in the murk of dark mornings. 

Overall it feels like Cannell is inviting us into a chalk circle — a crystalline reminder of the importance of this season’s self-made rituals. The walking to stomp out the sedation, to places that are far away from markets, shops, transport. The standing under the boughs of a tree, listening to a downpour. I recommend walking with Brightly Shone the Moon swirling in your ears, or listening on a bus home from work, peering out of the window. There is nothing twee in this winter collection — just a reminder to blink hard and look up at the sky.

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‘Brightly Shone the Moon’ is out now on Brawl Records.