Every decade or so, it seems that English folk and roots music develops the impetus to revisit and reinvent, taking familiar elements and bending them into new shapes that have the twin appeals of familiarity and newness. Such sudden reinventions have provided listeners with the work of artists as diverse and closely linked as Ewan MacColl, Fairport Convention, Steeleye Span, June Tabor, and Phillip Pickett; the music may hail from the present or from 600 years ago, and instrumentation may involved electric guitars, trap drums, concertina, and someone blasting away with a crumhorn (a combination likely to reveal the presence of Ashley Hutchings, with the Albion Band or without). The Rough Guide to English Roots Music pulls together 18 likely suspects, with an accent on the closing years of the 20th century, which means selections from Eliza Carthy & the Kings of Calicutt and Billy Bragg alongside such expected icons as Martin Carthy and the Watersons. There are some excellent choices to be found in this set, but it functions all too well as an appetizer -- indulging in this collection could lead to rash actions later, such as carting off boxes of albums of English roots artists, or purchasing one each of everything in the Topic Records back catalog; the most hopeless cases will never again be able to imagine having led a life without Ashley Hutchings. ~ Steven McDonald, All Music Guide