William Fitzsimmons – The Sparrow and The Crow (Naim Edge)

There’s a division of opinion forming at FolkingCool HQ. One that goes deeper than just whether the strap line on the front page is too twatty. More fundamental that the pitched battles that take place over the role of country music in a so-called civilised culture. This could spilt the site in two. Yes. You guessed it. It’s beards.

A recent review of Andrew Gordon’s You Don’t Need A Beard To Sing A Folk Song drew a line in the sand. A riposte comes from William Fitzsimmons, in the form of his album The Sparrow and the Crow, ably backed up by his colossal, sprawling, monumental, movement-inspiring beard. It’s a monster, a phenomenon. Big enough to camouflage a world-beating, National Geographic goitre, it renders every ‘Yo Momma So Fat’ joke immediately ripe for translation and simultaneously insufficient for the purpose.

The fact that the voice that emerges from the Schwarzwald is a sweet and unexpected as a lark’s makes this a double treat. Fitzsimmons has had a difficult life that led him to train as a therapist, and the songs he sings are doubtless tied to his own self analysis and healing. Written during and in the aftermath of his own dissolving marriage this is a sad affair, but not untinged with hope. We Feel Alone is balanced out, at least a little, by They’ll Never Take the Good Years. You Still Hurt Me is softened by (We’ll Love Again But) Just Not Each Other. It’s half a box of hankies stuff. Throughout twinkly picked acoustic waves are propelled by a breeze of a voice so close to tears you want to hug it.

Ultimately a bit low-key and emotionally leaky to be truly satisfying, but this is a solid album with its trampled heart in the right place, and I’m sure does exactly what it set out to do. And it’s one in the eye for the bald-chinned wannabes. I hereby re(sub)title this album You Don’t Need A Beard To Sing A Folk Song- But It Helps.

Stephen Taylor