Hannah Peel

Hannah Peel has been getting around. And that's a good thing. With a late February release of a new EP, Fabricstate, scheduled, HP has already released significant work, and worked with significant people, not least of which are John Foxx and the increasingly present Benge.

There is an unfortunate tendency nowadays to type female artists by appearance or, in a slightly more sophisticated vein, by aesthetic. Skip those tendencies with HP, please.

Peel is firmly rooted in a cultural perspective solely because she has a genuine voice that comes from history, personal and cultural. Her music is muscular and elastic, thought filled and proactive. Melding acoustic, electronic and electric elements, the songs are well proportioned and balanced. Lyrically they do excellently what song should do --- they tell stories, melancholy and subversive. And it is gorgeous --- silky and romantic and never cloying.

I won't pinpoint standout tracks in this squib because all of the songs are excellent and worth multiple listens. It's obvious that as much care went into their inclusion and sequencing as into their composition. Give yourself pleasure and listen.