While most people of Katie’s Melua’s age who pick up guitars go on to form angst ridden bands in order to vent their young spleen, has opted to express herself through the medium of light Jazz and blues and easy listening.
Unless you were listening to Michael Parkinson on radio 2 her first massive album Call Off The Search seemed to come out of nowhere. But before you can scat the words ‘hey presto’, was household. Melua, along with other Michael Parkinson favourite Jamie Cullum was pop music that your mum liked and therefore you had the blessing to like it to. Not like that noisy drug addled Babyshambles or scary ‘rapping’ music.
And so, she presents her second album of parent friendly easy listening, ‘Piece By Piece’ and it shows why she has become so popular - Melua has an impressive and distinctive voice.
‘Piece by Piece’ certainly lacks any edge her contemporaries Jamie Cullum and Amy Winehouse, who seem to have been tarred with the same ‘nu-jazz’ brush, may peddle. A collection of lush ballads with the odd scattering of Blues, one thing that does stand out for this album, is that has her own sound; nothing new or forward thinking for the genre but a classic easy listening, easy blues production coupled with classic songwriting finally topped off by her rich, dreamy voice.
However, her voice is so dreamy and wistful that when it comes to tracks such as ‘Blues In The Night’ you really are routing for her to let rip with a bit of rasp; this is not forthcoming however and it begins to get so dreary that it takes away from some of the impressive background instrumentation. She does get close to this rasp on another Blues inspired track, ‘On The Road Again’, but unfortunately it sounds a little forced and lyrically unconvincing.
The voice works perfectly for the rest of the album - especially on the Sade sounding opener ‘Shy Boy’ and easy listening ‘Closest Thing to Crazy’ tinted ‘Nine Million Bicycles.’
in general is really not my cup of cha and therefore it would be easy to rip ‘Piece by Piece’ to shreds. The reason I can’t is because the album shows that Melua has genuine musical talent and a distinctive voice which should stand the test of time; something all too rare in today’s ‘famous for being famous’ musical climate.
Rating: 2/5
Release Date: OUT NOW
Record Label: Dramatico Records
Words By: Remy FV
