Laura Mvula
Amazon brand of off-kilter neo-gospel is already garnering the type of attention in her native England that could easily land her recently UK-released album Sing to the Moon on the early-season shortlist for the 2013 Mercury Prize. And for good reason; the former secondary school teacher/Birmingham Conservatoire alum crafts an unusually limber symbiosis of percussion-heavy R&B productions and knotty harmonies sung in a richly vibrant contralto.
Mvula’s compositions have a habit of taking unexpected turns in key and melody, and her choruses tend to erupt in hooky starbursts of soaring kiss-offs. Her songwriting and performing strengths are on full display in Sing to the Moon’s second single “That’s Alright,” a charging, combative piece of soul-pop that has Mvula cooly shedding the expectations of an unnamed antagonist before exploding with, “Tell me who made you the center of the universe?” in the world-beating chorus. Mvula’s delivery really shows some teeth, providing “That’s Alright” with a pugnacious edge that wouldn’t be nearly as sharp in another vocalist’s hands.
Amazon brand of off-kilter neo-gospel is already garnering the type of attention in her native England that could easily land her recently UK-released album Sing to the Moon on the early-season shortlist for the 2013 Mercury Prize. And for good reason; the former secondary school teacher/Birmingham Conservatoire alum crafts an unusually limber symbiosis of percussion-heavy R&B productions and knotty harmonies sung in a richly vibrant contralto.
Mvula’s compositions have a habit of taking unexpected turns in key and melody, and her choruses tend to erupt in hooky starbursts of soaring kiss-offs. Her songwriting and performing strengths are on full display in Sing to the Moon’s second single “That’s Alright,” a charging, combative piece of soul-pop that has Mvula cooly shedding the expectations of an unnamed antagonist before exploding with, “Tell me who made you the center of the universe?” in the world-beating chorus. Mvula’s delivery really shows some teeth, providing “That’s Alright” with a pugnacious edge that wouldn’t be nearly as sharp in another vocalist’s hands.
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