James Eagle: After So Many Gone

Debut by Folk London editor James Eagle, featuring a cover photo from one of my favorite places: the Gravesend waterfront

Full disclosure: James is a dear friend, and I’ve been looking forward to him dropping an album

for ages. I’ve been singing with James (largely on Zoom) for coming on five years now, and I’ve always

been impressed by his way with a song. His voice is rich and gentle, his delivery tender, and he

has a knack for song choice that I will forever envy. His choices here flow seamlessly, from the

awe and sorrow of “Reedy River” to the quiet fury of “That ‘Un and This ‘Un,”and he sings them

all like old friends.

Of particular note is Gary Hopwood’s “The White Poppy,” a slick and timeless bit of anti-war

songwriting that really should be sung absolutely everywhere, and while I'm frequently partial to

his softer songs (“Waiting For The Ferry” has been my favorite since hearing it one lovely

afternoon in the Harrison Pub, though “The Death Ship” may have supplanted it at last) there

isn’t a track here that’s out of place.

I had the pleasure of singing in person with James for the first time in November of 2022, and I

was immediately struck by how much warmth and character I’d been missing out on from the

other side of a screen. Lucky for me, I got to hear James sing a lot that trip. He let me tag along

to every folk club and singaround he could think of in a two-week period, and there was hardly a

moment in between where I couldn’t hear his voice floating in from somewhere nearby (James

is, blessedly, someone who is always singing - in the kitchen as he’s brewing coffee or in the

back garden as he’s making friends with the neighbor cats or on the bus headed to the Harrison

or Sharp’s or the Goose).

Nothing ever quite compares to listening to someone in the same room, but this album sure

comes wonderfully close.

Truly there are few things as joyous as having a friend record an album. I'd recommend this one

even if I didn't know James, but because I do know him, it gives me tremendous pleasure to

recommend it all the more fervently.

After So Many Gone is available on Bandcamp:

https://folklondon.bandcamp.com/album/after-so-many-gone