Music Review / Thom Morecroft – Hand Me Down E.P.

If you believe the cover art of this, Liverpool based singer-songwriter Thom Morecroft’s, new crowd funded E.P. Hand Me Down, there’s a long story to recount about a guitar-laden street urchin in a town with no love for such minstrels. But, listen more closely and there’s a much happier story to tell.

After the still very ear pleasing Moon Moon Shake It E.P. from 2012, this release is a long overdue return with some new music and it’s a very good thing indeed. Beginning with the semi-confessional tales of Coming Up For Air, there’s a breezy conversational exchange going on here amid a description of various male relatives with lessons to take from their histories. 

Next is the perennial Thom Morecroft live moment, Daisy. Slightly reworked for this release, the song is still as fresh as, well, a daisy. Slightly melancholic but never entirely down it’s a song that never fails to retain its magic. Pride Hill follows with a lovely guitar melody and verse structure that is somehow redolent of those golden moments we all treasure. Lyrically, it’s more of a story of lessons learnt and not needing to be repeated and it’s possibly the darkest moment on the EP but somehow that’s all good. 

Closing the quartet of songs is another riff on height, (or lack of it), a topic previously covered more humorously in other songs such as the wonderful I Am A Tiny Man from 2012. ‘What Are The Chances That You’re Shorter’ is a short and sweet song that brings the release to a close with a happy moment. Overall then, it’s another great release from Thom Morecroft, his instantly recognizable vocals blessing another set of songs that cross the boundaries of modern folk into genuinely soul warming music that is defiantly human in a time when the world is so often turning against itself. 

Words: Sebastian Gahan / Image courtesy of Thom Morecroft.