The name Melissa James was a completely foreign one to me until this morning when, digging around on the interwebs for some new music to share, I came across two reviews of her debut album, Day Dawns. Before pressing play on any material I read both the reviews and got a feel for what I could expect when I pressed play.
The picture I had in my head was a British Lizz Wright, an artist who combines a large number of genres, namely soul, folk, blues, gospel and jazz, and combines them into a warm, organic, soulful sound.
Well I’m glad to report back that, after hitting YouTube, SoundCloud and her Bandcamp page I was pretty much spot on. Apparently Melissa has been creating quite a stir on the London jazz circuit, and her album release show earlier this week was completely sold out.
Day Dawns is officially released next Monday and is available to pre-order via her aforementioned Bandcamp page, but you can check out her live rendition of the simple-yet-stunning “Little Caged Bird” below to get a taste of what the album has to offer.
Darren SoulUK – Soul Bounce, June 2012