16 December 2010
The Morning StarJack Carr
Since All The Ghosts, Gwyneth Herbert has queered her jazz-folk release trajectory into a wonky, schizophrenic spiral encompassing stubborn drum and bass, rude-winking chanson and heartbreakingly open a cappella.
Perverting expectations, she has enlisted the likes of post-jazz auteurs Polar Bear to perform harmful medieval rituals on her music.
A kitsch highlight comes in the shape of So Worn Out (In The Bedroom) where a hot, crackling electric stylophone takes over the minimal ukelele counterpoint and pushes the track into a smiling stereo weirdness about twilight delirium on the streets of Hackney.
The beauty of the unvarnished version of So Worn Out lay in its somnolent chord and theremin cycle, which Temper D has indiscreetly turned into a d'n'b hook, though this as an anomalous turn.
Nevertheless, by the time the last heels have clacked out of earshot you will find yourself reaching for a rewind of this cheeky piece of plastic from a forward-thinking aesthete who manifestly thinks in yellow.