Jo Bywater
Album: Chasing Tales EP
Label: Searching For Dandelions
Tracks: 4
Website: http://www.jobywater.com

Jo's a Yorkshire-born, currently Liverpool-based singer-songwriter, whose music is unusual and challenging, exciting and rewarding. Her publicity talks of "acoustic blues slide guitar meets finger-picking brain food", which is probably a fair enough tag, at least to start off with.

Gritty delta blues guitar ushers in the pounding percussive rhythm of the opening cut, which can undoubtedly be felt to represent the Chopping Wood activity that gives that song its title; after barely a couple of minutes, though, this verse-structure gives way to a cooler slower section introducing the mellow electric guitar of guest Andy Jones into the mix, before the delta rhythm returns and lets rip for the closing reprise. The dark pensive beauty of Sun Shines Under Water then brings enigmatic imagery to its floridly twisted guitar embellishments of a basic rhythm to interact with the graphic expression of the EP's title, while the more lyrical (though still very much rhythmically-driven) This Garden employs a Michael Chapman-like motif (and Blythe Cooper's guest flute) as backdrop for Jo's uncompromising, surprisingly sensuous vocal and slightly unorthodox harmonies. The ominous muffled tread of the EP's final song, the intriguingly-titled Woollen Hearts, drives its eerie tactile poetry into a hypnotic pulsing mantra.

Yes, purely on the evidence of this latest EP, Jo is an absolutely extraordinary talent - as singer, a darned accomplished stylist with an unusual voice, and as a guitarist pretty phenomenal too, with that humble instrument uncannily responsive to the singer's own expressed and implied interpretive demands, working as one to communicate the songs' messages. Jo's is music of integrity, whose intense honesty (in that everything's prominently on display) matches its brilliance of execution. She gives no concessions to commercial or listener expectation, and pays barest lip service to conventional song structures, yet somehow her songs remain carefully crafted. But you can't ever relax into complacency when listening to Jo's music, and you'll find that this EP contains more genuine substance and invention in its pithy 18 minutes than many a highly praised LP release of twice that length; therein lies an impressive achievement. (Footnote: how the hell did I miss out on Jo's 2010 debut full-lengther Cycle Grace Pulse Break, then?…)

David Kidman