Song reviews

Steering her song “Broken Heart” safely down the middle of the highway, Glasgow's Stephanie Manns makes the mainstream, much like Jill Jackson before her, seem like the right place to be. A song to sing along with whilst driving in your car.

Fuzzily presented, “Alex McKinley” is the kind of song that suggests its creator, Joe DeVita, is a deeper thinker than most. However, his voice lacks the conviction necessary to get his point across before the song fades away.

Endearingly fragile as always, Aberdeen’s Cara Mitchell perches on the branches of the folk tree and sends “Dust to Dust” upwards to float upon the clouds. The song itself rambles somewhat aimlessly but at least her lyrics suggest that she knows that some clouds are rain clouds. Free download from Soundcloud.

Laidback and with more than a hint of Mark Lanegan in their musical motivations, Texas band The Division Men leisurely walk through the shadows of Americana throughout “Criminal”. Needless to say, the song is more about mood than melody.

Mainstream in his musical ambitions, ENL1TE clearly knows where downtown L.A. is and uses Valerie Broussard’s ever appealing voice to entice us into joining him on his journey into urban r’n’b territory. That road is a busy one but, with “Vertigo “on his iPod, he might actually see a green light or three on his way.

Musical degenerates the New Mystikal Troubadours continue their trek towards the dawn with “Sparkler”. This time there’s even a melody and something akin to a consistent tempo which, as their loyal fans will attest, is practically a sell out to the devils of commerciality. Much as with soup, it would seem that the best is usually homemade. Download from the Free Musical Archive.

Now we are getting somewhere. Downbeat and yet compellingly melodic, the vocal harmonies of Sopheak and Sophea Chamroeun add an elegant poetry to the music of Cambodia’s Krom with “Mekong Delta Blues” easily exceeding the sum of its unassuming parts.

Old fashioned but none the worse for that, Detroit’s Reverend Fly walk the seventies funk road with the aptly named. “Funk Me”. They’ve got the feel right and they’ve got the moves right so get out on to that dancefloor and, as they used to say way back when, shake your groove thang!

There used to be this thing called light entertainment and, with a wry sense of humour on his side, Richard Haswell invokes its ghost for two and a half acoustical minutes on the glories of getting old. In “Virtual Record Collection” he even manages to name check Aldi so he’s alright for urban cool too.

An easy rolling rock song, as they used to say back in the seventies, “Loving You From The Start” shows that Amazon Blonde know how to mix musical fluency with conventionality. However, the rather familiar lyrics don’t give the female vocalist much to work with but she nonetheless gamely goes for gold anyway.

Essentially, and probably cosmologically, low key, Left rummage through the streets like urban folksters armed with a laptop and a sense of isolation for company. Downbeat certainly, but their appeal should exceed the boundaries of the headphones permanently on brigade.

An Argentinian rock trio with a sound grasp of what is expected of a band in their genre, Fear Me December keep it both low key and muscular all the way through “Good bye to You” with the restrained, almost girlish, vocals of Lintu Doll adding a twist of lemon to their cocktail.