Maybe it's just my imagination, but Tough Love seems a touch warmer - the emotions running through it closer to the surface - than its stellar predecessor Devotion. And whether or not that's true, it's just as glossily, sleekly elegant and just as good - in fact probably a hair's breadth better.
An odd comparison maybe, but I wonder if Jessie Ware maybe occupies a similar place in the crowded pop-soul field to that staked out by the National under today's big tent of indie-rock - both seemingly relatively unpretentious, unassuming acts that on the surface aren't doing things all that differently from a whole lot of their contemporaries but who, through some unpredictable and unexpected combination of song-writing smarts, talent, pop intuition and zeitgeist-channelling have struck a vein which elevates their music well above the common mill.
Highlights: "Tough Love", "You & I (Forever)" (the record's sugariest, most immediately replayable moment), "Want Your Feeling" (yes, I was surprised too to like what's basically a slinky little disco song so much), "Keep on Lying". Special mention for "Kind Of...Sometimes...Maybe", which sounds more like TLC than anything else this side of 1996.
An odd comparison maybe, but I wonder if Jessie Ware maybe occupies a similar place in the crowded pop-soul field to that staked out by the National under today's big tent of indie-rock - both seemingly relatively unpretentious, unassuming acts that on the surface aren't doing things all that differently from a whole lot of their contemporaries but who, through some unpredictable and unexpected combination of song-writing smarts, talent, pop intuition and zeitgeist-channelling have struck a vein which elevates their music well above the common mill.
Highlights: "Tough Love", "You & I (Forever)" (the record's sugariest, most immediately replayable moment), "Want Your Feeling" (yes, I was surprised too to like what's basically a slinky little disco song so much), "Keep on Lying". Special mention for "Kind Of...Sometimes...Maybe", which sounds more like TLC than anything else this side of 1996.
