I'll be honest with you right from the start, I must confess to being a sucker for a female vocal, it's the one thing assured to make me sit up and take notice. Since my days as a young gothic garbed rocker slavishly following All About Eve around the country and being totally captivated with the dulcet tones of Julianne Regan, my taste in that respect hasn't changed much. Suzanne Vega had a similar effect and even in more recent times Dido seems to recapture that quality that always appealed to me. I will be the first to admit that she is a one trick pony, she has one style and that's really it, but there is something in those ethereal, breathy sounds that gets under my skin. So that said, when I first heard K T Tunstall's break through single " Other Side of the World" there was much that appealed to me and I knew that this was someone that I was going to have to explore further.
KT only took up guitar at the very late age of 16, although she had already mastered piano and flute and had honed her voice listening to Ella Fitzgerald. After spending time in America soaking up gigs by 10000 Maniacs and the Grateful Dead she found herself returning to her native Scotland to become part of the scene that spawned such cult bands as The Fence Collective and The Beta Band. From there it was a short trip to London, U2's producer and the Album that I find myself listening to as I write.
The album kicks off with the aforementioned "Other Side of the World" a song that neatly blends the soft sophistication of the likes of Dido, with a richer, less fragile delivery and a folk sensibility. Very much still one girl with a guitar dominating the song but with the neat use of double tracking, multi-layering and additional piano, not to mention simple drumming nailing it tightly down. There is a full band playing but the minimalist approach to the production reminds you what is being offered up here and the girl with her name on the cover remains the main event at all times. Names such as Beth Orton on a particularly happy day and even the queen of them all, Carole King are not out of place as comparisons here but KT (apparently the text-generation version of her actual name, Katie) still has enough of her own way about her to not come off as a mere copyist. So this was where my familiarity ends and from here on in it I would have to see if the rest of the album stood the test.
"Another Place to Fall" immediately heads of in another direction, a sub jazz drum shuffle and self assured rhythm and blues drive makes it worlds apart from the opening number, a style that rivals the likes of Bjork for the quirkiness of its tempo, but retains a slick sanity that our favourite Icelandic hobbit never quite manages to rein in. Around this point I'm starting to think, well maybe there is nothing that new here, but not everyone needs to break new ground, its often enough to say "its not what you do (especially if you are pretty much doing what everyone else is) it's the way that you do it." With that in mind there is no denying the panache of the opening two numbers and I'm quietly confident for what's to follow.
And what follows is the sparser "Under the Weather" and KT's voice seems to take on a youthful aspect and sounds not too dissimilar to Suzanne Vega in its approach but set apart by her Scottish burr in the voice and the willingness to beef the music up from folk to a laid back rock dynamic in the middle eight. "Black Horse and The Cherry Tree" another up and coming single carries us off in a more gospel soul direction but its dominant acoustic guitar grounding it in the folk-pop sound that pervades the rest of the album. The infectious chorus gets right in your head, on even the first listening, and whilst that has your attention an electric guitar slowly powers the song up to a climactic finish.
"Miniature Disasters" is another minimal song, heavy on the percussion and again tipping its hat to gospel in the vocal department. This is however the first song that doesn't really hit home on first hearing, for me anyway. There is nothing inherently wrong with it, all the ingredients are there and on paper I'm sure it looked like a winner, but somehow the songs is less than the sum of its parts. Maybe its because the album has set itself a fairly high standard just in these first few numbers but we can allow her a few less than brilliant moments.
There is a smooth late night quality to "Silent Sea" a richness of the voice, a laid back soul feel to the vocal delivery and a very spacey accompaniment on the guitar and drums that leaves lots of roam for the bewitching and versatile delivery. The musically fairly ordinary "Universe and U" may not be any great shakes in many ways, but again the voice seems to make up for it. It is however the sort of song that the likes of Christina Aguilera would die to have a shot at, a song that really is designed to promote the vocals above all else. That said she'd probably go totally over the top and murder it anyway so maybe we should forget that idea. This song, like many others on the album typifies the fact that although this is very much an album of the moment it would very easily slip onto the Radio 2 play list without a second glance. "False Alarm" passes buy without creating much of a stir, but as the next song wanders into view I realise that I actually know two songs by the artist. "Suddenly I See" is the sort of upbeat pop groove that the album was crying out for at this point. It has the same flavour about it as the recently re-launched Nerina Pallott who is rightly picking up a bit of airplay at long last. Heavy edged guitar power chords and dominant bass notes resonate in perfect contrast with a jaunty acoustic guitar and bouncy rim shot rhythms.
The affected guitar sounds of "Stoppin'the Love" and the slow stomp that it sets in motion are a contrast to the previous number but its sumptuous multi layered vocals and brooding background violin win through. The last two songs "Heal Over" and "Through the Dark" take the album into a darker, mellower place. Not that there's anything wrong with this but I was hoping that there would be more brighter upbeat numbers and the album seems to end on two low a note for my liking.
One of the things that she seems most proud about is the fact that she very much writes her own songs. Although with the recent flurry of young female solo acts, Tunstall seems to be hitting the scene at a very opportune time, she rightly sees herself as slightly set apart from some of her competition. As she pointed out in a recent interview Katie Melua has only two co-writing credits on her whole album and Joss Stone seems content to release an album of covers. "Self-expression" as the young Scot wryly observes, "is not a team game".
Lyrically there seems to be little new here, songs of trouble isolation and reflection seem to dominate and even the more upbeat songs seem to have a more reflective nature to them when put under the microscope. I did like this album, not as much as I was hoping I would, two more tracks akin to the singles and it would have done the job for me. That said its still a great debut and KT Tunstall is someone to look out for in the years to come.