Mostly Autumn: Go Well Diamond Heart

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Melders of some of the least promising, easily abused genres of music – folk, Celtic, goth, prog – there’s always the horrible prospect of Mostly Autumn emerging as some sort of female-fronted Runrig, an appallingly earnest pub band leered at by Lord Of The Rings fans who think they’re in with a chance.

Go Well Diamond Heart, the MA debut for Olivia Sparnenn, who has replaced Heather Findlay, is unlikely to break the band out of the comfortable cult that they have created for themselves, but it is nonetheless a creditable progression. This is well-played, competently composed 70s rock, with all of its traditional virtues and sins.

Violet Skies and Deep In Borrowdale, for example, have plenty of sweeping melody to them – and lots of sixth-form lyrics, too. Sparnenn’s clean tone is too often relegated to behind the prosaic drone of Bryan Josh; it’s only when she sings that Mostly Autumn have the character to intrigue the less smitten listener.

Jon Hotten

Jon Hotten is an English author and journalist. He is best known for the books Muscle: A Writer's Trip Through a Sport with No Boundaries and The Years of the Locust. In June 2015 he published a novel, My Life And The Beautiful Music (Cape), based on his time in LA in the late 80s reporting on the heavy metal scene. He was a contributor to Kerrang! magazine from 1987–92 and currently contributes to Classic Rock. Hotten is the author of the popular cricket blog, The Old Batsman, and since February 2013 is a frequent contributor to The Cordon cricket blog at Cricinfo. His most recent book, Bat, Ball & Field, was published in 2022.