Adoptive Scot Jill Lorean has certainly been in and about the Scottish music scene for a good few years but this new EP may be her best output yet.
Some of the six tracks here may be familiar to anyone who has seen her solo live show, but opener ‘Strawberry Moon” gives us the full drums and bass monty, coming on like Kirsten Hersh, and that’s a real compliment in BM’s book… Wonderful and a true thing of beauty… and that additional synth just completes it perfectly.
‘Permanent Look’ is slower but highlight’s Jill’s astounding voice, and has some pretty amazing backing again – later on it transforms into a guitar thrashout, which surprises and is again very brief, all songs are three or four minutes but pack so much in…
Next, ‘Red Brush in Danger’, which references the flowers we are all taking solace from at the moment – but this is dark, haunting and even more so when the drums and bass kick in – eldritch and beautiful in equal measure… it ends with a Gothic guitar coda, wow!
Lead single ‘Eyes On the Bird’ which has more of a Scottish trad lilt to it, lovely but again it has a slightly mordant and gothic feel, and that guitar/synth combo is to die for… it really is!
‘Your Younger Self’ is threatening, but again mordant, dragging out memories in a sympathetic way, and maybe as an act of catharsis… hard to say but my God it is moving and affecting…
The last track is the longest, but ‘Axe To Grind’ has a different sound to the rest – maybe more personal, who knows, but again it is a great song with some odd instrumentation, eth vocal soaring over it, with some chord changes which confound this for being a real ballad.
In all, top notch stuff, JL has surpassed herself here, and BM would dearly like to hear this set live, (another cancelled launch for which BM had a ticket) – for the moment this will do…