Brand new this year to Warwick Folk Festival.
Concise descriptions of The Unthanks range variously from “music that asks you to consider everything you know and un-think it”, to “a take on tradition that flips so effortlessly between jazz, classical, ambient and post-rock, it makes any attempt to put a label on them a waste of time”.
“There are few times when you discover a band and they stalk immediately to the heart of everything you love and hold dear.”
Maxine Peake
Much more than a band
Using the traditional music of the North East of England as a starting point, the influence of Miles Davis, Steve Reich, Sufjan Stevens, Robert Wyatt, Antony & The Johnsons, King Crimson and Tom Waits can be heard in the band’s 14 records to date, earning them a Mercury Music Prize nomination and international acclaim along the way.
They have one Mojo Magazine Folk Album of the Year twice, they were the only British folk representation in The Guardian’s and Uncut’s Best Albums of the Decade (worldwide, all genres), and count amongst their admirers, artists and storytellers including Elvis Costello, Maxine Peake, Rosanne Cash, Martin Freeman, Robert Wyatt, Martin Hayes, Nick Hornby and Dawn French.
But The Unthanks are much more than a band…
