Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
The heart at times may be as barren and seemingly lifeless as the Mojave, but the mind is forever on the verge of flourishing, of adapting, changing its opinion and the way it observes the world; it is what makes a change of mind and vision so exhilarating to witness, and which kick starts the heart into its own adaption, but never losing the fascination that comes with the sultry and emotionally passionate flowering of all the Marigolds and Sunflowers as visions of the Desert Hearts.
The sweeping sense of beauty that greets the unknown explorer who believes that nothing can grow or thrive in such a scene, are always surprised when the colour and occasion greets them. It is the same for the mind when it is introduced to a firm favourite changing the way they appear, not drastically, not with harsh radicalism, but with an even greater portrayal of significance adding depth to the pleasure that is associated with them.
In accepting the change in the way that the musical landscape must alter for an artist to grow, for the bloom first seen to add shimmer and landscape is to know that has been inspected closely and given a breath of fresh perspective in which beauty lays undisturbed. It is the same for the artist, and in this case the extraordinary music of John Jenkins.
For one of the most prolific songwriters in Merseyside, the view of change comes in the form of Desert Hearts, an influence painted on delicately as it plays with the themes of solitude, tempestuous feeling and reflection. It is not just intense, but creatively ingenious, courageous and daring, for the artist who understands that they must be flexible, is the one who produces the most demanding and exhilarating of plots in which to urge new growth.
It is the musical lover in him that sees Joh Jenkins new, but understandably content, direction for this particular single, one in which to wish the artist his just reward, his repayment for taking the incentive on. A handsome piece of music, epic, pleasing, a song of sensitivity and difference.
Ian D. Hall