Elle will be doing a free in-store appearance at Rough Trade West, 130 Talbot Road, London W11 1JA on Monday 4th July at 6.00pm. Please try to get along if you're in the area, and do let all your friends know about it. Copies of the new album will be available and it's a chance not only to hear Elle perform an acoustic set in an intimate record shop setting, but also to support independent music retailers... you can pre-order the album from Rough Trade by clicking on the logo above.

Here's a link to the Facebook event page for this gig: Elle at Rough Trade

"Perhaps Elle Osborne isn’t really a folk musician, but an avant-garde experimenter using traditional tunes as vehicles for her ragged, ripe visions... It’s taken Osborne ten years to complete her second album. Luckily, her approach appears to be timeless." (Stewart Lee)

"An instant winner. Whether its a 19th century Shaker hymn or a modern piece like Barry Dransfield's Handsome Meadow Boy, she inhabits a song fully... Slowly Slowly marks a welcome return to the fold." (Neil Spencer, Uncut ****)

"Quality trad... she brings a modern dewiness to the 10 traditional tracks here. Although the musicianship is excellent, I particularly found myself drawn to the unnaccompanied Fair Annie." (Jeanette Leech, Shindig)

"Wayward focus and maverick intensity... the sheer rawness with which she presents this mostly traditional collection is slowly winning me over. There’s something wonderfully eerie, for example, about the way her droning fiddle dominates the mix over her voice and the waves of Alex Neilson’s drums on the shanty I’m Bound Away and it takes a rare sort of recklessness to bring something new to a song as well-known as Three Score And Ten. Whatever else, she doesn’t want for courage or imagination." (Colin Irwin, fRoots)

The album is released via Proper Music Distribution on 4th July. You can now pre-order a copy to ship on the release date at the folk police shop.

Elle Osborne is appearing at the Slaughtered Lamb, Clerkenwell, London EC1V 0DX on Wednesday 8th June to support her forthcoming album So Slowly Slowly Got She Up. Support is from the excellent Irish traveller singer Thomas McCarthy. Tickets are £6.00 from We Got Tickets and the doors are open at 8.00 pm. This should be a great night for any of you in the London area.

And if you're in the Lewes area, Elle plays a free in-store set at the Union Music Store on Saturday 28th May at 3.00pm. The store is at 1 Lansdown Place, Lewes, East Sussex BN7 2JT and is just the sort of increasingly rare independent record shop Folk Police Recordings is proud to support.

We've made Elle Osborne's self-released debut album from 2000, Testimony, available as a download via Bandcamp. There are still a few CD copies left, which you can buy from the Elle Osborne website.

Meanwhile, Elle's forthcoming album, So Slowly Slowly Got She Up is out on 20th June. Here's what James Yorkston has to say about it: "I asked Elle to play a show with me back in 2003 after I heard her amazing debut album Testimony ... I've kept in touch with her ever since; collaborating on the odd track, meeting up at festivals and such. Then, recently, she sent me her new album. I was amazed. The singing, the arrangements, the atmosphere... It's my album of the year so far, for those who are interested in that sort of thing. And there's been a few good albums already, including one or two I've bleated my way onto. God Bless the good ship ElleO and all who sail with her." 

Here's a sneak preview:

The Oak, Ash and Thorn Project and Elle Osborne's Good Grief are now available in the Folk Police on-line store! Good Grief will be in record shops via SRD from 31st January (winter snow and flu delayed the release by a week) with Oak, Ash and Thorn following it out into the world on 21st February. We also hope to have both albums available as downloads soon too - we'll keep you posted.

The Oak, Ash and Thorn Project has received its first review. Tim Carroll at Folkwords has described it as a "folk milestone", adding "This miscellany encompasses an extensive melange of talent. Some may not consider the album presents a 'perfect storm' of folk, but this intriguing anthology is pretty damned close". You can read the whole thing here.

Meanwhile, Elle's Good Grief e.p. continues to receive plaudits. John Mulvey, writing at Wild Mercury Sound, Uncut's new music blog, believes that "There’s a sense that Osborne is drawing lines between the drones and atmospheres of the avant-garde and their ancient antecedents in the British folk tradition" adding that "This one’s a good start to 2011."  Fatea Magazine reckon that Good Grief is "An EP that feels as though you want to hold it to your chest and feed it soup... It's got a real timeless feel to it that enhances its dark charm." And Organ Magazine calls it "A radiantly quiet piece of acoustic folk beauty that’s voiced in such a glowing way... Her songs stand tall in the storm and don’t falter - beautifully beguiling, simple, uncluttered, perfectly textured rich folk songs that slowly slowly reveal themselves."
Finally over at our blog page, Raymond Greenoaken has kindly provided us with an extended version of the sleevenotes he has written for Oak, Ash and Thorn.