Gabrielle Aplin
Album: English Rain
Label: Parlophone
Tracks: 12
Website: http://www.gabrielleaplin.co.uk

You may not know the name, but 20-year-old Gabrielle Aplin made a huge impression on the music-buying public when her breathy version of Frankie Goes To Hollywood's The Power of Love featured on a John Lewis advert and subsequently made it to number one.

Naturally, that cover is at the heart of her debut album, but what of the rest of her material?

Please Don't Say You Love Me transits its perennial message to an unwanted admirer with the kind of easy charm the Mumford have taught millions to settle for, but its comfortable musical setting belies a surprisingly sophisticated analysis of romance that's not immediately obvious. Elsewhere though things are much less revealing - Panic Chord is a by-number folk pop with a piano figure that's neat enough, but not very substantial, while Human sounds like a self conscious attempt to break her own mould.

Still, it's easy to be all old and wise and heard-ita-all-before, when this album is meant for the young and inquisitive. If it's picked up and played to death by fresh faced mall rats on their final summer before university then so be it. If it leads those kids to the good stuff - and the ghosts of Joni, Drake, John Martyn and Sandy Denny are all over this record - then it will have opened the door to the next generation.

Let's be optimistic…

Nick Churchill
www.thegranvillechambers.co.uk