Album Review: Jade Diary - Mermaid

Mermaids are the mythical, transcendent creatures that have captivated the human imagination for centuries. We are drawn to the idea of their existence because of the mysterious, magical and ambient quality that surrounds them, and thus, Jade Diary aka Cheryl Lim's latest release Mermaid is so aptly named.

Lim matches her melodic tones and emotionally rich lyrics with some fantasy-inspired synth to produce a debut album with a dream-like quality that's second-to-none. Introducing us to her work, Lim pulls you in with opening track Mermaid, which, funnily enough, familiarises us with the idea of the mermaid's beauty, while simultaneously allowing us to explore every gorgeous facet of Lim's melodic and haunting vocals.

An album with more highs than lows, each track has a different selling point – whether it is the lyrics in Cold Hearted that Lim passionately sings, “Your scent it lingers and it steals away my sanity.../Blinded by beauty and seduced by my vanity”, the perfect match of synth and percussion in A Thousand Days, or the soaring, lingering vocals in Lucid Dreams, each song wraps itself around your eardrums and tugs until it has engulfed your whole body.

The album is an exploration of various sincere, well-articulated emotions, without sounding whiny and repetitive. Like the swift, yet graceful movement of a mermaid, this album flows flawlessly through a saturated music scene, leaving you in bewilderment of what you have just experienced. It's hard to fault this album. Jade Diary's debut is something Perth, and Australia, should be proud of.