PALOMA FAITH
The Glorification Of Sadness (RCA)
At first listen, Paloma Faith’s new album feels like it’s being released at the wrong time of the year. It very much comes across as a summer record – perhaps, then, making it welcome and needed in the wet, grey British midwinter.
Faith’s exquisite vocals are faultless across all 17 tracks (these include two interludes that feel like a personal voice message from the artist). Feeling like a diary of sorts following the end of the artist’s marriage, The Glorification… really is private and raw at times: we even get to hear voices of Faith’s children sampled in the background of Divorce.
There is a strength in this vulnerability though. This, bar some minor clichéd examples, is not a “I feel bad for myself and want you to feel bad with me” type of work, but an honest, powerful and empowering album both lyrically and from the music production perspective. We have a number of moving power ballads, like album opener Sweatpants, and some huge, techno influenced, night-club instant classics like Cry On The Dance Floor.
If The Glorification Of Sadness is at times uneven, and could do with editing out a couple of songs in pursuit of making the whole even stronger, I’m willing to let it slip and continue throwing air-punches while listening to it, feeling like a main character in a movie – because for all its privacy and vulnerability, The Glorification Of Sadness makes a universally relatable album, even for listeners without the experience of divorce. We all get sad at times, and sadness can be powerful and glorious.
words GOSIA BUZZANCA
