SOME people wear their music like a favourite coat - each mark or caught thread tell a story or a place. Tammy Payne would probably need a cloakroom, she's done just about everything from work a cruise liner to score a brace of dance hits. But a pass
ion for Syd Barrett and Hendrix via Arcade Fire colours her haunting second album.
After the beats and folk of her debut comes a waft of soulful psychedelic folk and genre-hopping honesty to intrigue and delight.
Beach House, Devotion (Bella Union)THIS Baltimore duo have been swift to follow their enchanting debut album with this at times frisky trip betraying influences ranging from dreamy Mazzy Star to the swirling grist of Spiritualised.
Victoria Legrand's versatile vocals breathe life into vignettes that stir and wow but would ultimately be quite ordinary without multi-instrumentalist Alex Scally's foresighted arrangements which, while occasionally Robin Guthrie vague, yield a subtlety that reels you in.
Tegan & Sara, The Con (Vapor Records)IF you've heard the single of the same name you'll probably already have been bewitched by Oregon's Quin twins. Punchy, pouty and getting a bit too good at this, their fifth album pulls favours from some credible underground guests to deliver a record that is commercial enough to secure airplay yet edgy enough to keep the sniffy critics on board.
The sound is insistent by one turn and all out melodic the next, with the sisters stamping their personality throughout to make them more than simply the 'all girl White Stripes' some had them pegged as.
Donny Osmond, From Donny With Love (Decca)NOT missives from the home of the Rovers and St Leger but a cunningly-timed (for Mother's Day) collection of loved up covers from one of the most amiable blokes in the business.
He may have missed Valentines Day but this soppy 20-track treat takes in Puppy Love and I Can See Clearly Now to When I Fall In Love and Bread's If, all done in Donny's nice guy style. It includes What I Meant To Say, co-written with Gary Barlow and Sheffield's Eliot Kennedy.
The full article contains 383 words and appears in Sheffield Star newspaper.
