Galleons and planes in a single context may scream of steampunk, yet it’s all par for the course where STEELEYE SPAN are concerned, since a lot of their works is rooted in the merging of folk material with contemporary rock arrangements. Still, the veterans’ forthcoming album – the band’s first full-length studio offering after 2019’s jubilee-marking “Est’d 1969” – should take this stylistic marriage further. Titled “Conflict” and comprised of a dozen numbers, the record that’s to be out on May 23rd will pick up where four fresh cuts on 2023’s “The Green Man Collection” left off.
In the musicians’ own words, while their two preceding platters concentrated on applying modern sheen to traditional fare, the new pieces explore traditional themes of Air, Land and Sea through modern compositions, originals and covers alike. Most of these tracks will be familiar to the ensemble’s fandom since the majority of them have been performed onstage for the last few years, but “Blow Boys, Blow” and “Genocide” were previously recorded for the band members’ solo albums, the former first appearing on Maddy Prior’s “Bib & Tuck” in 2002 and the latter on Rick Kemp’s “Escape” in 1996. Solid!
Conflict
1. Over The Hills And Far Away
2. Sound Of The Drum
3. Dogs And Ferrets
4. Trees Are Whispering
5. Low Flying
6. Honey Bee
7. Blow Boys, Blow
8. Skip To Shore
9. I Am An Oak Tree
10. Ghost Ship
11. Genocide
12. When All The World Was Young Lad
