Jessi Teich
Album: Twisted Soul
Label: Madame Freak
Tracks: 13
Website: http://www.jessietech.com

One of the great things I like about Fatea is never knowing what is going to drop through the letter box next. The routine for a new arrival is the same, ignore the press release and stick the cd straight in the player, then read the blurb. It's a lesson I learnt many years ago from either prioritising albums depending on what I'd read and it sold me more than one duff direction, now it's all far simpler, listen first, read later.

Jazz is not one of my go to genres, I like the lighter side well enough, but generally it's not an area that I peruse. Similarly whilst you wouldn't find Jazz FM on my preselects, I wouldn't switch channels is jazz comes up on the radio, so for a whole album with jazz at the core to keep my attention throughout is rare.

It's said that which doesn't kill you makes you stronger and since her last studio album, Jessi has survived both an abusive relationship and an operation that threatened the primary tool of her trade, namely her voice. The silver lining being that whilst she wasn't able to sing, she seems to have spent the time well honing her writing skills.

Of the thirteen tracks that make up "Twisted Soul", Teich penned eleven of them and arranged the two cover versions, "Clap Hands" and "Cry Me A River", the Timberlake song, rather than the Julie London one, though the arrangements bring both closer to each other.

This is undoubtedly a jazz album with forays into blues, soul and pop, whilst retaining a level of sophistication and some great playing from the core of musicians that have been drafted in, I suspect from Parisian clubs from near where the album was recorded. It also sounds like quite a cathartic album with a number of issues laid bare. That said Jessi Teich, does not wallow in self pity, the darker side is not a woe is me sympathy gainer, rather an expose of how emotions can take otherwise sensible people down a nightmare ride and the strength it takes to come back up again and it's that feeling of redemption that takes to the fore.

"Twisted Soul" is on the lighter side of jazz, but no less worthy for that. And fruity red wine is as good as a hard hitting one, it's the food and company it keeps that helps make it what it is, Jessi Teich hasn't created an album for all seasons, but one that's worth a place on the rack for when the moment is right.

Neil King