Julie Tippetts & Martin Archer - Serpentine

Julie Tippetts, is one of the greatest female vocalists England has ever produced, and over five decades she has produced a small but vital body of work ranging from pop to free improvisation. This duo with Julie has no desire to repeat itself from album to album. Following on from the poetry and soundscape debut release Ghosts of Gold (2009) and then the complex sprawl of Tales of FiNiN (2011) (both figuring variously in Wire Magazine and Jazzwise best of the year lists), comes the comparatively shorter, stripped down and simplified Serpentine, wherein we revisit (mainly) tonal and rhythmic songforms which enable Julie to explore, at greater length than on our earlier releases, a style of performance at which she naturally excels, and yet which has often been overlooked in favour of her more freeform work of the last 3 or 4 decades. Yes, this is an album of songs, with Julie on powerful rock and soul inspired form throughout.

Serpentine delivers rewarding material that's imaginative and immensely satisfying. - Sid Smith, PROG

FOUR STARS - The third and finest recent outing from Julie Tippetts and Martin Archer. It's even billed as their pop album, though this pop is offbeat and oblique and dipped in dub. Fans of Sunset Glow will know that back in the mid 1970s she was startlingly strong at the point where song form meets melting point. She still is. - Marcus O'Dair, Jazzwise

Julie Tippetts - voice, chimes, amplified doll's house
Martin Archer - electronics, keyboards, woodwind
Pete Fairclough - drums, percussion, washboard
Gary Houghton - lead, rhythm and glissando guitars