Album Review: Deena - Black Cat

This is the kind of album that could be taught in schools as a perfect model for gravitational pull – a stellar voice surrounded by a drifting, indifferent whirl. Opening track, Cupid, the standout by far, is stripped-back, snarling, pre-historically heavy and serrated. With its midnight, horror-movie swagger, the whole thing pulses at the same rate as a heart. Across the record, Deena’s voice, with its dark rubato core, is the slim-bladed, versatile thread tying everything together. It’s the texture around it that occasionally fails. Despite its visceral bluesy highlights, this is a singular talent wrapped in common foliage.