There’s no question of the fact that in less talented hands, this album would be an overwrought mess. Plenty of Lianne La Havas‘s [Twitter] contemporaries have similarly powerful voices (and hers is one of the most soulful and passionate I’ve heard in quite some time, certainly in this genre of music), but most of them would surely spoil the broth with too many cooks. La Havas, on the other hand, knows just the right ingredients to use, and the result is a sumptuous album. She doesn’t have the time for syrupy ballads (indeed, the token ballad that is often present on albums of this ilk is completely absent here), and this alone should set her apart from the pack, but in many ways, she is a mile ahead of everyone else in her field.
The production of Is Your Love Big Enough? gives the album a massive sound, even when there isn’t all that much going on. Lost and Found features only guitar, bass, drums, piano and La Havas’s powerful vocals – she doesn’t fall back on anything so overused as a string section – but the effect that this combination has is such that it is layered and full-sounding in ways that it shouldn’t be; this is an album that grows out and surrounds the listener, instead of letting one thing take centre stage. There is always a lot going on, but never too much. This is once again audible on Au Cinema, its confident shuffle helping the album to settle into itself after the curtain-raising Don’t Wake Me Up and the snappy title track.
It’s easy to forget that there have been four singles released from this album already, but there’s no shortage of single-worthy material. Even if this is music geared less toward the pop charts than some of the 22-year-old’s contemporaries, seeming to have more in common with folk and soul than anything else, it’s very accessible, and this has a lot to do with La Havas’s wonderful way with a melody. She chooses her guest spots carefully, too – not to mention sparingly: Willy Mason’s smoky vocal crops up on No Room For Doubt, one of the more laid-back moments on the album, but there is, well, no doubt that La Havas is the star. She’s a surprisingly grounded one, too, and this is reflected in the album’s style.
She knows how to pack a punch, though, and this comes through most obviously of all in her lyrics. On the striding, supremely confident Forget, she doesn’t hold back: ‘Forget all the words that let you break my heart / Forget that I’m the person tearing you apart’ (before following it with ‘I guess it’s time for me to leave’). Ouch. She’s penned a number of great sets of lyrics in her time, but luckily she’s avoided the kind of clunky, prosaic lyrics that could drag down an album this musically accomplished (even the ‘I found myself in a second / I found myself in a second-hand guitar’ couplet that opens the title track is pulled off with finesse). Overall, Is Your Love Big Enough? is a surprising album; it’s not often that artists of this ilk completely live up to the promise that they once showed, but La Havas does. The best thing is that she would retire next year if she felt she’d made her best album – she has a while to go yet, but this is an absolutely sublime start.
Is Your Love Big Enough? is out now via Warner
[BUY] Lianne La Havas – Is Your Love Big Enough? @ Amazon / iTunes
