Sweet-voiced Welsh singer-songwriter Lowri Evans handles a number of subjects on her latest recording Everyone Is From Somewhere Else which follows her Corner Of My Eye (2013) album.
Evans’ vocals are beautiful, and she writes good songs, enjoys sympathetic musical support as her own acoustic guitar is backed by percussion, double bass, piano, violins, ukelele, cello, electric guitar and keyboards on different occasions. With a strong country feel, 1970s hinted maybe “Who’s Loving You Tonight? has a wonderful rhythm and is loaded with superb playing. Fuelled by powerful electric lead guitar (Lee Mason) to some degree it reminds me of Emmylou’s (Harris) Hot Band days, such the energy and fiery musicianship. It is one of the occasions the music gets away from the safe and warmly embraced fare the record is built. Nothing wrong there, only there’s times you feel the songs need a little extra.
Loaded with talent Evans produces a fine effort in “Piece Of Me”, on possessing a warm folksy feel it is of the kind I could imagine Melanie doing. Close your eyes and may well too. Unhurried throughout, Evans makes singing seem so, so easy, never more so than on “Stars” (co-write with Henry Prestman and Pete Riley), or on “Somebody’s Girl”. There are others too. Only she needs to either strip one or two songs down even more than some are or repeat the presentation of “Who’s Loving You Tonight? Shake it up some, she can do it too, maybe bring in a cover or two, give her beautiful voice a challenge.
Other songs to make an impact include the light mid-paced “Rolling On” and the melodious lead off track “Don’t Know Why” and the clever “Everyone Is From Somewhere Else” as she produces a song I am inclined to label as cityscape, nice it is too.
Maurice Hope