Originally published by L.S. Media. May 29th 2012.
L.S. Media Rating ****
Paloma Faith has the uncanny knack of making even the most uplifting music appear dull in comparison to her stunning voice and lyrics that scream genuine and absolute desire to be taken seriously as one of the leaders of everything anti-pop.
Although the music that glides along with bounce and verve through every song on her new album Fall To Grace has the ability to get your heart beating and play with your fibre, the interesting and almost unique lyrics turn the album on its head and give an almost Machiavellian approach to her music. There are so few writers that have this quality, the almost wanton destruction to raise you up with the music but then to bring you crashing down to Earth, not just with a bump but with the force of a meteor that has wandered to close to the gravity pull. What marks Paloma Faith out as a complete talent is the sheer audacity that performs this ability and the seeming revelry that she takes in it.
Paloma Faith’s album doesn’t just deserve to be heard, they need the desire to revel in the lyrics and taken apart line by line by a psychoanalyst. When you look at some of the lyrics in depth, as on this album you really should, lyrics from every song will jump at you and leave you wonderfully concussed and you try to work out if Paloma Faith is for real. Unashamedly, she really is and an incredible woman and lyric writer she is too.
Tracks such as the opening number Picking Up The Pieces with its refrain of, “Do you think of her when your with me?”, 30 Minute Love Affair and Agony has the jaw dropping appeal to make you question the moral ambiguity that she sets up for the listener to hear. In very much the same way that her role with Ray Davies of The Kinks and their reworking of Lola left anyone hearing her addition to the vocals and her love for the butch transvestite riveted, each song that Ms. Faith has recorded for this album is an absolute gem in being able to turn the argument 180 degrees till you won’t know which way is up and where the real songstress begins.
A gem of an album and a pleasure to get to grips with.
Ian D. Hall