Any artist is welcome to send us a track via freshonthenet.co.uk anytime between Monday lunchtime and Thursday morning (or when we receive 200 submissions, whichever is sooner) - and all our moderators, including Tom Robinson, will listen to every track. This is our full inbox from the week beginning Mon 17th May: from Friday afternoon you'll be able to hear our shortlist and pick your favourites on this week's Listening Post which will appear at freshonthenet.co.uk/batch406

If a track you submitted does not appear in this list, it’s probably because another of your tracks appeared in our Fresh Faves or on the BBC Music Introducing Mixtape during the last three months — we ask that artists featured on either wait three months before resubmitting to give others a chance. We also don’t accept short previews or SoundCloud GO tracks that can only be heard as 30 second previews, and tracks made private after submission, which cannot be included in playlists. You will be able to resubmit the track in future. Tracks that have been previously submitted and tracks from banned artists will also be removed.

ENTIRE INBOX: Batch 406

Thanks to everyone who came by Fresh On The Net at the weekend to check out  Listening Post 406 and tell us which tracks they liked best. Here, in alphabetical order, are our readers' top favourites. Our reviews are written by Fresh On The Net's Andy Page - and you can read them at http://freshonthenet.co.uk/faves406

Fresh Faves: Batch 406

An ever growing list of favourites from my musical rummaging

The Big Grey Playlist

Back Then

New single from experimental folk collective, Folkatron Sessions, from their upcoming EP Home No More, out July 2nd 2021. The arrangement of the Irish classic, "An Bonnán Buí (The Yellow Bittern)", was inspired by Anne Brigg’s iconic solo vocal version, a Thomas MacDonagh translation of the original poem by Cathal Buí Mac Giolla Ghunna. The song, exploring grief and alcoholism, was reimagined for intricate electric guitar, synth, flute and string textures, with a stunning vocal performance from Hannah Jacobs.

folkatronsessions.com

About Folkatron Sessions

Folkatron Sessions are a collective of 8 folk, jazz and electronic musicians from England, Ireland and France who bonded over a love of ‘genre-bending’ [Folk Radio UK] folk music. Their ‘unique soundscape’ [Songlines Mag] refracts trad folk through electronic, jazz, ambient, sound art and prog rock lenses.

They met in 2017 at an Upcycled Sounds experimental folk residency, spending an intense week arranging, performing and recording their debut EP Mais C’est Quoi Maman. Enthusiastic reviews from Folk Radio, Eliza Carthy and Ian Stephenson spurred them on to create their debut album Skiver in this same residency format.

In just 6 days they wrote and recorded a ‘pioneering’ [Songlines Mag] album. Its 2020 release on Upcycled Sounds Records saw Folkatron Sessions featured in Songlines Magazine, on BBC Radio 3, BBC Radio 2, 6 Music and Folk Radio UK. 

Their next EP is out July 2nd 2021.

Credits
Arranged by Folkatron Sessions.
Produced by Upcycled Sounds.
Edited and mixed by Upcycled Sounds. 
Video by Upcycled Sounds.
Artwork by Upcycled Sounds.

Folkatron Sessions are: 
Rémi Allain - double bass and vocals. Normandie, France.
Philippe Boudot - drums and percussion. Normandie, France.
Hannah Jacobs - piano, synth and vocals. Suffolk, England.
Nicholas O’Brien - sound design and clarinet. Paris, France.
Jack Ó hAonghusa - flute, bodhrán and vocals. Ballymore, Ireland.
Lauren Spiceley - fiddle and vocals from Oxford, England.
Martha Wiltshire - cello and vocals from Oxford, England.
Joe Woods - guitar and vocals. Suffolk, England.

Folkatron Sessions - An Bonnán Buí (Yellow Bittern)

Wild Garlic is a romping, stomping springtime anthem, with a bluesy guitar groove and playful lyrics that conjure up the frisky energy of a May day in the woods.

From Almanack EP, out on 2 July 2021, inspired by the changing seasons over a year in Devon. Pre-order here: https://edwardrandell.bandcamp.com/album/almanack-ep

Written, performed, produced and mixed by Edward Randell
With special guests Thomas Broda (drums and percussion) and Joanna Goldsmith-Eteson (vocals)
Recorded in Devon and London, summer 2020 – spring 2021
Mastered by Peter Beckmann at Technology Works

Lyrics:

It is the wild garlic time of year
That's why I roved out to find you here
Where every green tongue is gonna sing
About the high fever of the spring

Oooh...

And in this cool shady glade of trees
I hear those wild garlic harmonies
The way the juice hits me with its hum
Between my first finger and my thumb

Oooh...

Must be the wild wanting mood I'm in
Makes every touch crackle on my skin
So let your heart open like a bud
For we have wild garlic in our blood

Oooh...

Down on that green blanket we could pull
Enough to fill all our pockets full
So let your tongue take another taste
Before the young season goes to waste

Oooh...
Aaah...

Wild Garlic

UPDATE! Huge thanks to Elizabeth Alker and her production team on BBC Radio 3 - was a complete thrill to hear this track on her Breakfast show (17th July 2021). Thanks to everyone who has visited this page since and posted messages too! means SO much. So motivating!
(this is what she said if you didn't hear it live....https://soundcloud.com/helefonix-midlifemix/elizabeth-alker-radio-3-plays-how-to-fly?in=helefonix-midlifemix/sets/radio-introductions)

This track also made the coveted Fresh Faves from the Tom Robinson (and team's) Fresh Faves on 26th May 2021! A real honour and I'm positively buzzing!
 
"The beauty of How To Fly is instant...the most remarkable thing is just how organic and natural the track is... Helefonix is better known in the music scene as Helen Meissner, promoter and champion of independent singer-songwriters for the past decade or so. She discovered her creative muse in the form of an iPhone App during lockdown, and a few months of perseverance has resulted in an extraordinary output of creative variety and uniqueness” Andy Page, FOTN moderator.

"Hot on the heels of my 6 Music spin of Song Thrush Serenade, (thanks to Cerys Matthews), How To Fly sets BBC Radio 3's @IMcMillan's prose & dulcet tones to music, accompanied by a pastoral plethora of fauna & church bells. A bit of rustic charm & bucolic bliss. Out 28 May!"
This track is on my next EP Nature's Grace, which can be pre ordered here.
If you pre order, you will receive this track immediately as a download.
https://helefonix.bandcamp.com/track/how-to-fly-ft-ian-mcmillan

It's on Spotify too! (if you partake!) https://open.spotify.com/track/7vmAmQGOUlqaeo5xXMlSgG?si=1c78f908fef6423c

How To Fly combines poetry, pastoral vibes and eclectic beats. It features the specially written prose and dulcet tones of poet/broadcaster/presenter of Ian McMillan, presenter of BBC Radio 3's The Verb. (lyrics below)
Ian's distinctive, warm, Yorkshire burr provides the perfect vehicle for his evocative prose. A mellow tone pervades, set off by evocative strings and keys plus a plethora of found sounds. I've spent many a frosty morning recording local found sounds to bring the message in the track to life, the church bells from my village, blackbirds, robins, chaffinches, geese and lambs.
Release date 28th May 2021.

This track will be on the EP Nature's Grace which you can pre order here https://helefonix.bandcamp.com/album/natures-grace

TEACHING DARKNESS HOW TO FLY BY Ian McMillan

This light
Met that light
At last night’s 
Leading edge.

All light
Is found light
Between the back road
And the hedge

That light
And this light
Mix their colours
In the sky

All light
Is new light
Teaching darkness
How to fly

(Teaching Darkness) How To Fly ft Ian McMillan

'I ain't got an ounce o' class, Sugar, honest...'

Classy

Clapped Out Anglia

The Ritual

One Small Mistake

Here's an early mix of a track, 'Teetering On The Edge', which will be on this year's - 2024 - album ('It's Nice To Be Niche'), due out in October. Is it a song for the Flat Earth Society? No, but it could be. Is it a song about falling over? No. Do I like the word, 'teetering'? Yes, I do. It's a great word! But also, sometimes it does feel as though we are all Teetering On The Edge.

Teetering On The Edge

SYLVIA

Surf rock influenced post punk tune duet about social anxiety and existential dread

Sometimes_Geography of the Moon

Sister Peyote

Draw another circle describes a melodic and melancholy walk around familiar roads and paths that lead into one another. A circuitous route through small town love.

The relaxed, strolling acoustic rhythm and high floating melodies sooth while the thud of synth bass and drum make you quicken your step or press down harder on the go pedal . This New Wolves sound is slowly becoming more familiar and distinct with these old world acoustic and recent world synth sounds meshing together.

"Written in the Autumn of 2020 when the world had shrunk down to a few alleyways and empty streets around my part of the city, I felt both comforted and lost. Draw another circle came out of this time and place."

Mixed and mastered by Eddie Al-Shakarchi who produced Boy Azoogas' debut album.

Draw Another Circle

Written by Jamie Wooding
Produced by Sugar House Studios
Mastered by Robin Schmidt @ 24/96 Mastering

Clapped Out Anglia

Jimmy Andrex & the Bible of Dreams