Thursday, December 28, 2006

"Blue on Blue", Leigh Nash

I got this for Christmas, and I am a little disappointed.

Leigh's voice (Sixpence None the Richer) has lost none of its gorgeousness. It's a well produced, musically pleasant CD. You could put it on and nobody - not even great-grandma - would be in the least offended by any of the songs on it. But frankly, it's too nice. Too many of the songs are about the fact that Leigh is now happily married and deeply in love. Wonderful. But the poetry and struggles that were conveyed in the songs Matt Slocum wrote for Sixpence are just not there.

I see Windows Media Player classes it as "Religious". Integrity Music (I think!) also slapped a sticker on the front of the CD bought in the UK that took some soaking off. I suspect that this is a marketing ploy, because unless I'm missing something, the strongest religious content here is saying that being with somebody is "my idea of heaven", or that the somebody is "my angel tonight". Or "In heaven, love is everywhere." Oh please, Leigh. Perhaps the songs are really Christian devotional taking pop as their idiom - but when they become indistinguishable from saccharine pop, they have lost too much of their edge.

Some of the songs are a step above. "Nervous in the Light of Dawn" (for which Slocum had a writing credit) and "Ocean Size Love" are the two I guess I like most of all. The words of "Just a Little" have good poetry about them.

But I bought this on the back of having worked my way through the Sixpence catalogue. I really don't think that people would start here and be inspired to go back and find out what else Leigh had done. If you think you might want to buy this, then please listen first to the outstanding "Divine Discontent" or "This Beautiful Mess".