Despite being big news in the States – 110,000 sales and counting plus a No.1 on the Billboard New Alternative Artist chart –“download diva” Imogen Heap has yet to transfer this success across to her native land.
Yes she’s a Brit abroad and one who is building up quite a reputation via myspace where amazingly she seems to have acquired more friends than Madonna and The Arctic Monkeys. Could three be the magic number for Heap after critical acclaim for her debut solo release “I Megaphone” and her successful collaboration with producer Guy Sigsworth “Frou Frou”?
“Speak For Yourself” is certainly an oddly compelling pop album that attempts to stretch the genre in a more interesting direction than you’d care to imagine. Opener “Headlock” for example is a deceptively catchy slice of electronica that creeps up on you from out of nowhere. The album’s second single “Goodnight and Go” meanwhile is a particularly delightful beast, skittering to and fro the synths and beats deployed here display a refreshing lightness of touch, lulling the listener in subtly while not relying on the sledgehammer drum and bass combo that passes for the foundation of most modern day pop music.
“Loose Ends” is an altogether more straightforward affair by contrast recalling a female fronted Postal Service, although it lacks the magic ingredient that makes the former band so compelling. The sparse electronica of “Hide and Seek” is rather flat and undeniably the weakest moment on this album, Heap’s vocoderised vocals grating here when given a more natural feel they would surely soar and raise the track beyond the level of grey mediocrity it currently resides in.
Thankfully she redeems herself with the glitchy electronic pop of “Clear The Area” a superior ballad, its icy synths and imperial gloss frame Heap’s best vocal performance thus far. It’s disappointing then to run into the almost goth-lite and near obligatory rocker “Daylight Robbery” which is rather too clever for its own good, seemingly caught in two minds as to whether a) it wants to be a power ballad or b) a more straightforward pop-rock anthem. Disappointingly it ends up sounding like an un-convincing mix of the two. It’s a shame really as the album would definitely be strengthened by one or two more up-tempo moments like the raunchy “I Am In Love With You” a strangely seductive R&B electro-pop gem that would definitely make for a fine third single (in the unlikely event that Heap’s paymasters at Sony BMG are reading this).
Alas much of “Speak For Yourself” seems to drift in and out of focus. It’s undeniable that Heap has a wonderful voice but far too often the tunes simply can’t match up to their early promise, the latter half of the album in particular drifting past like a rather mundane Sunday afternoon. Heap’s voice is the album’s key selling point though, a distinctive but odd blend of Fiona Apple and Heather Nova it’s an intoxicating mixture that can seemingly turn from the breathy to the passionate in the space of a bar it’s a shame therefore that a majority of “Speak For Yourself” can’t match up to its giddy heights. This is by no means a bad album but the odds of it turning the UK on to Imogen Heap seem to be stacked against it.
