London Grammar – If You Wait
Columbia Records
-out now
4 / 5

It’s simple, really: just have one gorgeous, haunting voice and support it with piano and light (light!) guitar, drums, and set it to simple but powerful melodies… well, now you’ve got the UK trio known as London Grammar. We’re not usually one to nod along to such straightforward, well, bliss, but lead vocalist Hannah Reid just pulls, pulls us in, all without belting, all within a comfortable range. You can barely hear her stretching, which is all the more remarkable, considering that she makes us, the listeners, stretch. It’s emotive, minimalist, direct and just unmitigated joy from edge to edge.

“Strong” is their lead single here. But if you think that their uplifting single is all they have, then be sorely mistaken. Each track has a great build, a great arc; “Sights” likely has the most developed song arc of all of them, and like half of the other tracks, is strong enough to be another single on its own. There are no throwaways here, and each track is written well; but make no mistake, we’re here to enjoy Reid’s voice here. This isn’t one of those brilliant albums, not in a cerebral sense, but it’s just pure pleasure – as music was made to be.

We’re going to throw this at you as a recommendation. It’s straightforward, down-tempo pop, but we just can’t help but enjoy it. Check it out at the link below, then check it out at your retailer; recommended.

Check out these guys (and gal) on Soundcloud.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I accept that my given data and my IP address is sent to a server in the USA only for the purpose of spam prevention through the Akismet program.More information on Akismet and GDPR.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.