One of the highlights for me from this years end of the road festival was Essie Jain. Since i purchased her first album we made this ourselves last year I have been trying to keep an eye on her but didn’t actually realise she was playing at the festival until i got there. A captivating live performer, her minimal chamber folk really comes to life. She plays piano and guitar and has a rather haunting but beautiful sounding voice. Her new album, The Inbetween follows on rather nicely from her first with it’s intimacy and frailty and with some very delicate strings and horns too which are just enough to maintain the rather spooky folk sound that she’s created for herself. Not an album you would stick on when friends visit for dinner, this is definitely an album you put on while you are on your own, submerge yourself in it as some of the lyrics are stunning. I think she’s a serious talent in the making and will keep an even closer eye on her from now on. She has been compared to the likes of Sandy Denny and Vashti Bunyan but I think that’s mainly due to her singing style rather than her music. Although born and raised in London she is now based in New York and is on the Ba Da bing label in the U.S and the leaf label for the rest of the world. Enjoy.
