Radie Peat – Hares on The Mountain
Shirley Collins sang “Hares on the Mountain” on her 1959 debut, again with Davy Graham in 1964, and once more in 2023. Radie Peat learnt it from her and puts it first on her debut solo album. Her version keeps the old song’s trick of turning courtship into a world of animals and uses it to point at how unevenly the game is played between men and women. The first impulse is revenge, and by the end it has settled into something more useful, a wish to learn and grow. Her voice is steely and strange over an arrangement that moves slowly and carries real weight, nearer a drone than a backing track, and as across the whole record, she plays every part herself.
It opens “No Human Tongue Can Tell”, made with John “Spud” Murphy and out 13 November on Rough Trade Records UK. Still I Love Him (W28) gave an obsessive love song a new melody, The Moon and Stars (W38) rewrote one to put the woman’s side on record. Three singles in, every one has handed an old song back to the woman singing it.
Tour dates
- 3 November: London @ Union Chapel (sold out)
- 20 November: Dublin @ Vicar Street
- 2 December: London @ Rough Trade East
- 31 January 2027: Amsterdam, NL @ Paradiso
- 1 February 2027: Paris, FR @ La Trabendo
- 19 May 2027: London @ The Barbican
