Tell My Sister Nonesuch****

Kate and Anna McGarrigle's eponymous 1976 debut is not a perfect album, but there is nothing about it that I would change. Its timeless melodies, shimmering voices, songs of honest pain, vulnerability and simple joy and its unabashed pride in roots parlour-room music make it a desert-island disc. In the wake of Kate's death last year, Joe Boyd and John Wood have remastered the original recording and that of its successor, Dancer With Bruised Knees, and compiled unreleased recordings and demos that essentially cover the same ground.

The result is impressive. The original transfer from analogue to digital was a little muddy. Cleaned-up, wonderful songs and performances such as Heart Like a Wheeland Mendocinohave lost none of their ability to touch. Kate's alternative reading of the title track is a wild pleasure. See mcgarrigles.com

Download tracks: Heart Like a Wheel, Mendocino, Tell My Sister