The sad thing about Flora Smith’s latest single, ‘Autumn Blue’, is that autumn is the last thing I’m thinking about right now after suffering endless months of miserable Manchester winter that turns you blue. Every bit.
If she was singing about spring lambs gamboling around fields of buttercups where young lovers frolicked in the long grass on page one of their journey of lurve then it would probably push another couple of buttons.
But the setting apart this is another slow, sultry indie pop/soul/jazz fusion of the sort she has come to specialise in, as if Sade and Amy Winehouse had somehow overheard each other singing in the ladies’ toilets on a night out and recorded a single song on the spot for posterity.
I’ve observed before how Ms Smith has that innate ability, possessed by so few, to convince you that she’s singing the song just for you. That you’re the one she’d like to be there waiting for her when she arrives home alone, rather than just an empty room and an emptier bed.
While she doesn’t sound like Fiona Apple (who does?), I’m also impressed by her Apple-like ability to convey emotions, to make you want to be part of her world, not merely on the periphery.
In fact I find it very easy to picture this song being performed at Largo in Los Angeles, still LA’s coolest joint, on a packed Friday night, with musical accompaniment from Jon Brion and Rufus Wainwright.
She’d be in good company. And so would they.
I really hope it can happen one day.
(Continues after the Spotify link).
The album ‘The Concept of Love’ is released on March 27th. Now that’s an interesting title. No half measures there. It’s as in your face as ABC’s ‘The Lexicon of Love’ from 1982, one of that decade’s greatest albums. Flora doesn’t mind setting herself a challenge!
Find her on:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/flora.smith.37625/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/florassmith/
