Rae
Album: Awoken
Label: Self Released
Tracks: 9
Website: http://www.raemusic.co.uk

Rae is the collective name for a four-piece fronted by singer-songwriter-guitarist Leonie Evans, who's backed by Lorenzo Prati (tenor sax), Leon Boydon (bass) and Dan Truen (drums). Though based in Bristol, they'd originally met up at Totnes' Dartington College Of Arts, a centre noted for being a fertile ground for creativity and exploration. The musical diversities of the members' backgrounds both spurred and encouraged the evolution of a uniquely individual style of expression, which owes as much to jazz and cabaret and lounge-blues as to avant-garde contemporary classical and indie. In fact, it's the cool-but-soulful jazz vibe that predominates on Awoken, which turns out to be Rae's second album (its debut, Era, came out on Syd Arthur's Dawn Chorus label in 2011).

For most of its length, Awoken is a mesmerising listen, driven by Leonie's extraordinary vocal performance around which are wrapped fluid, meandering lines and surprisingly delicate instrumental textures, the end product being seriously tasty, if occasionally tough to assimilate. There's a distinct late-night/early-hours vibe to Rae's music, rather like the music you'd wind down to then wake up to after an evening gig, at the same time relaxing and unnervingly stimulating. Melody lines wander around and take unusual directions, yet Leonie and her cohorts always appear in complete control of the bar-lines and responses.

Tempos are generally pretty relaxed too, and the rhythm section is both as tight and as loose as each song demands, reacting to and conditioned by the cascading vocal contours. From the precision be-bop of the slightly funky Espy to the jittery beat of Heart Stopper, from the casual café-cabaret of My Plan (great sax solo!) to the eerie, ethereally poised Awoken and the tumbling mirror-images of Phononomous. On the latter song, there's a kind of schizoid feel about Rae's musical adventure that strangely recalls early King Crimson (moments of sublime discord that crash in out of nowhere. Once or twice, the overall sense of direction seem to come unstuck just a bit, as on Sublime Notion where Leonie's oblique yet emotional lyrical flights of fantasy inspire some technically brilliant sax work, and the recounting of A Dream somehow seems manufactured, grounded in leaden rhythms that stumble less than convincingly.

But Awoken is still a cunningly sophisticated record; by the time you've reached the end of its 36 minutes you really do feel as though you've experienced a lot more (and in greater depth) than this on-the-surface-meagre time-span might normally deign to supply. The closing Song For Friends is a tour de force of questioning for Leonie: its tempo may appear to relax, but it does so quite ominously and the conclusion could be seen as a hollow victory of pretence.

David Kidman