Album Review: Paloma Faith - Fall To Grace

The alternative girl's chanteuse has been a reigning trend emerging from the UK these past few years, and treading similar waters waded by Amy Winehouse and Florence Welch is Paloma Faith. A self-branded singer and 'artist', Faith uses second album Fall To Grace to explore more cinematic territory than  2009's Do You Want The Truth, Or Something Beautiful? but it's mostly at the expense of more sincere tracks on offer here.

Lead single and opener Picking Up The Pieces is a case in point. There's no doubt the girl's got a cracking voice, somewhere in between Amy's self-mutilating drawl and Florence's forcefully honest warbling, but backed by early-'90s bombastic synth and dancefloor pulse it soon gets a bit silly. 30 Minute Love Affair and When You're Gone follow this sweeping symphonic build to some grandiose use of string accompaniment, while Blood, Sweat & Tears excites Faith's fondness for Chaka Khan, imbibing some disco soul into her woman-scorned delivery.

Occasionally the craziness works, like the tango-infused dubstep of Let Your Love Walk In, but when most of these overly employed production elements are swept aside, some real gems are uncovered. It's when Faith pipes her quite interesting social commentary bereft of studio effect on Black & Blue, and clipped throaty tones in Let Me Down Easy that the barrier crumbles and we're told a story instead of hearing one glossed over.

The trouble with Fall To Grace is that it relies too heavily on a kind of branding; moments of surprise are too few and far between and the meeker but ultimately more genuine moments are straddled too much by a heavy-handed approach.