Rachael Lavelle: Big Dreams – An uneven listen but rewarding nonetheless

Drifting between Laurie Anderson, Björk, Jane Siberry and Tune-Yards (aka Merrill Garbus), the Irish songwriter and avant-pop practitioner Rachael Lavelle sometimes treads a very thin line between substance and artifice.

On this album, the spoken-word input of Gratitude (never an easy thing to get right) arrives after a twinkling The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe-style musical flurry; My Simple Pleasures (which outlines “a sunrise swim followed by a bowl of fancy porridge and a Machia latte … travelling, hiking, discovering … chicken-fillet rolls and Fanta”) sounds like Lemon Jelly without the whimsy. After listening to Let Me Unlock Your Full Potential’s free-floating spirals of dream time, you want to bathe yourself in Gilla Band or Black Flag.

In other words, Lavelle sometimes doesn’t find the right balance between self-expression and challenging experimentation. But her charisma adds oodles of vitality and an elegant euphoria to the title track, Night Train, Perpetual Party, Travel Size, and Sleepy Gal.

Her singing voice is particularly strong – it soars beautifully on the title track – while many of the layered music beds comprise soothing patterns of under-ether pleasures. In the album’s favour, also, is its sense of creative ambition and its inner-dialogue explorations of anxiety and self-worth. An uneven listen, then, but rewarding nonetheless.