III Seen, III Said

'Girl From The Hills' opens Dot Creek's debut with a quietly twanging guitar, before a plaintive male voice urges someone to fetch water from the spring, and you think, 'OK, I'm in the middle of Nowheresville, Alabama.

Actually, the truth is that Dot Creek are a Dublin quintet who, aside from being steeped in a rich musical heritage from Johnny Cash to Will Oldham, are more Tallaght than Tennessee, more Navan Road than Nashville.

'The Blacque Waltz' swishes in with buzzsaw guitars, gothic sentiment, gallows humour and enough backwoods longing for a Cormac McCarthy box-set or one of old Nick Cave's murder ballads. The fragile vocals of 'A Weight' are countered by the instrumental strength of 'Nuisance Gator', the latter being possessed of the cutest intro in the world ever, courtesy of one Kaya Quinlan. 'Cast' glides by with a welcome airiness, while the beautifully delicate 'Wintering' is a contender for the best song Will Oldham never wrote.

Dot Creek trade in real country music, complete with real emotion and real soul, with nary a 'yee-hah' in spitting distance.