My record collection
[302] Various artists - Cathedral Classics Volume One (CD)

Back in April I wrote about Cathedral Classics Volume Two the second CD collection celebrating the fabulous Sonic Cathedral Records splendid output. In that post I wrote “The first volume of Cathedral Classics had Dean & Britta’s White Horses on it, I thought I had a copy of that as well but it seems not” - but…

Cathedral Classic Volume One

… shortly after the post on Volume Two was published Nat from Sonic Cathedral replied on the Instagram post - “I’ll send you a Volume One!” - by the end of the month an envelope dropped through the letter box with this very lovely comp inside.

Dean & Britta’s contribution to the disc is the Sonic Boom mix of White Horses - the song written by Michael Carr and Ben Nisbett for the UK import of Yugoslavian/German TV show Ferien in Lipizza, it was credited to “Jacky”, who is actually Jackie Lee. The theme song was so successful that it was apparently dubbed back onto non-English versions of the show.

This disc, from 2009, is a selection of tracks from the labels first eleven singles and not a duff track amongst them… and Sonic Cathedral haven’t stopped releasing great music in all that time.

Last year the label celebrated its 20th birthday and as part of that celebration released a beautiful 4xCD compilation Celebrate Yourself! The Sonic Cathedral Story 2004—2024 - at the time of writing the Sonic Cathedral Bandcamp had three copies left and 62 tracks for 30 quid is not to be sniffed at!

… and the releases keep coming - last week a fantastic new album by Lorelle Meets The Obsolete landed on my doormat, and Holy Island by Sister Ray Davies arrived yesterday and is every bit as good as I kind of knew it would be; the second Whitelands album arrives next year; The Early Years - who were on Cathedral Classics Volume One - released a single a few weeks back, their first new music for nine years, with hints at an album for next year.

Sister Ray Davies - Holy Island (Sonic Cathedral, 2025)

Honestly I can’t believe there’s any label anywhere that has been so consistently brilliant in the 21st century.

• Catalogue Number: AHFOW 10/176
• Artist: Various artists
• Title: Cathedral Classics Volume One
• Packaging: Jewel case
• Format: CD

Previously in my record collection:

• [204] Various artists - Celebrate Yourself!
• [244] Sonic Cathedral: Cathedral Classics Volume Two