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Evans McRae - Only Skin - Album Review

Check out our review of the new @EvansMcRaeMusic album Only Skin. #albumreview #newmusic #pcnmagazine #patchchordnews

On 21st May ‘21 Evans McRae – a new venture from songwriters Lowri Evans and Tom McRae – released their debut album Only Skin.  The 45-minute 11-track album mixes beautiful melodies, lovely harmonies and great musicians. The songs on the album range from soft piano numbers to heavier ones with ‘80s jazz trumpet.  Evans McRae have managed to find a way to mix their voices in a beautiful way,…

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Album Review: Evans McRae - Only Skin

Album Review: Evans McRae - Only Skin....

A songwriting retreat sounds like a place for new songwriters to head, in hopes of developing ideas and finding new ways of polishing songs. Not quite where you would expect to find established writers and singers Lowri Evans and Tom McRae. But that is where they met in 2016, at a retreat organised by Kathryn Williams. This placed them on a journey to initially writing together before realising…

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Evans McRae album review

Lowri Evans is a Welsh singer, and Tom McRae is an English one. They met at a songwriting retreat and formed their band Evans McRae. Their first album together, Only Skin, will be released on Friday, May 21, 2021.

Scene: As dusk falls and the streetlights appear, you step in out of the summer rain, store your umbrella with the herd of others, and find your place in the stylish lounge, seating yourself in a suede-lined high-backed chair, a cup of scalding hot tea at your side, waving to acquaintances, and settling in as the musicians gather on the candle-lit stage.

At least that's how I imagine the proper setting for hearing the cinematic, timeless new album from Evans & McRae. In reality, it may still be raining, but most likely you're still stuck at home, in an old uncomfortable chair, pressing play on one device and connecting it with another, your wireless speakers broadcasting this modern, innovative collection of songs to your living room. It's still lovely, still a welcome break from the monotony of the day, but it pales in comparison to being in the presence of the creators.

Only Skin progresses in a theatrical manner, almost constantly shifting between the two different perspectives of the singers, as though they're continually entering and leaving the stage once they've said their piece. Yet their feelings often melt together, as they do on opener "Say What You Mean", where they plead for honesty from each other. The title track further calms us with a meditation on the often fragile connection to embodied presence. They sing in lilting, sepia tones: "If only I could take the weight from your chest, you know I would / I will give you all my heart, it's strong enough for the both of us / After all, it's only skin, keeping it all in", reminding us that when it's all too much to bear, we can lean on others for renewed strength.

The mood shifts outward on "Careful", the crooning warning sounds confronting leaders of our world who daily plot to deceive us, while "High & Lonesome" reigns us back in to the duo, the stars of the play, who now sound depleted and distanced, longing for reconnection: "Here's to a fallen star, and a broken heart, and a high and lonesome cry / A broken bottle blues, another whisky tune, but you're still on my mind".

"Love's a Loaded Gun" and "Sleep With One Eye Open" mirror each other with ominous orchestral swells, calling out, "You know me, I'm still the one / I'd live or die for you", only to hear the independent response, "Hear my cry, it echoes through the night / You won't be the one to let me live or die".

The range of feelings shifts once again for the last few songs, with "Hold On" and closing track "Just Falls Apart" offering a shelter from the storm of reality, a reprieve reminiscent of McRae's "Hoping Against Hope". Only after directly identifying and addressing the darkness we're in can we realistically frame it by shining hopeful lights around it. "To the friends we lost on the promised lands / To the bonds we break under your command / And everything I touch just falls apart / And everyone I love just fades away" serves as an essential dirge for all that we've lost - the people and places and experiences that used to help us cope, but the music is still tinged with hope, with a promise to hold on, and with a spark of belief that tomorrow will be kinder.

You can pre-order the album here