Having released her debut solo album Watch The Fireworks on the legendary 4AD in 2007, it’s perhaps appropriate that Emma Pollock’s sophomore album sees back her on Chemikal Underground, the label she co-founded and which this year is celebrating its fifteenth anniversary. Much has been made of her membership of The Delgados and Chemikal Underground founding, but hopefully the focus will start to be on Emma Pollock: solo artist.
Watch the Fireworks was a hugely enjoyable album, and tracks like ‘Adrenaline’ and ‘Acid Test’ were amongst the best of 2007. It was perhaps a more immediate album than The Law Of Large Numbers (a title that Pollock, the high priestess of Scottish indie has said that she herself doesn’t understand). However, repeated listens over the last two weeks have reaped rewards for this listener. Bookended by a piano theme of ‘Hug The Piano’ it features a keyboard motif which continues into ‘Hug The Harbour’, the first track to do the rounds from the album.
The album has some far more unusual arrangements than its predecessor; no more is this shown than on my favourite track on the album, ‘Red Orange Green’ which eerily evokes the feeling of a child’s muscial box, possibly just before it goes insane (I mean this as a compliment). And the lyrics still pack a powerful punch: “How you gonna break my heart/when you’ve never even made my day?” she sings on ‘I Could Be A Saint.’
Emma Pollock’s music has won many fans over the last fifteen years in the guises she has been working in, and there is no question that without her contributions to the Scottish music scene, it would be a poorer place. She’s still delighting and surprising us here, and long may she continue to do so.
