ALBUM REVIEW: The Unthanks – In Winter

Rabble Rouser

Released: 29/11/24

Christmas albums are tricky beasts, especially if you’re one of those people who find the holiday season problematic – traumatic even – and baulk at most seasonal offerings: weaponised sentimentality, tinsel-clad mawkishness and fake snow-dusted faux-bonhomie soundtracking awful parties. There are a handful of exceptions – Low’s Christmas album has no equal of course, but there are fine collections from people like John Fahey, Aidan Moffat, Tracey Thorn, even Vince Guaraldi’s incredible Charlie Brown Christmas. What these albums have in common is that they lean into the sweet melancholy of Christmas, a warm sad communion, rather than the screechy sparkly Mariah Carey version of the holiday.

And it should come as no surprise that The Unthanks have made a wonderful contribution to this very select canon with In Winter, a long-planned pet project of the Unthank sisters brought to life by the regular five-piece band but expanded to include strings, vibes, and reeds (courtesy of the perennially amazing Faye MacCalman).

From the Britten-inspired opener In Winter’s Night, a lovely piano interlude from Adrian McNally (which ends with a door closing to keep out the snow) to the closing Dear Companions, featuring a sixty-strong choir made up of participants from their famed singing weekenders, In Winter feels like one piece, and is sequenced without gaps to let you fully immerse yourself as the port takes hold. The nineteen songs range from new compositions to trad or folk tunes and carols given a new twist by McNally’s inventive, often surprising arrangements (a fuzzed-up guitar on O Tennenbaum caught me off guard). The ghost of Guaraldi feels ever-present throughout, and I can almost imagine an animated group of Unthanks raising their faces to the Christmas tree as they deliver one gorgeous song after another. There are full-throated singalongs but also delicate, tentative ballads – the sisters have never sounded more lovely – and wonderful takes on everything from Dark December to Gower Wassail to The Snow it Melts The Soonest. In Winter is an absolute gem, one of the finest albums the Unthanks have given us yet and guaranteed to soundtrack Christmases for a long time to come. Excuse me, I appear to have some glitter in my eye.