Josh Ritter: So Runs the World Away | CD review

(Pytheas)The centrepiece of Josh Ritter's fifth album is a piece of folkloric daring. Under the title of Folk Bloodbath, he gathers together the key figures of American murder ballads into one song and interweaves their stories, using a refrain from Mississippi John Hurt as the glue – and so the lives of Louis Collins, Delia Green, Stagger Lee and Billy Lyons become part of one bloody continuum. It's marvellous: seemingly solemn, but the black humour in this procession of gore is signalle...

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