I have never been able to understand what people see in the wailing vocals of Mariah Carey, what is so impressive about having a five octave vocal range when the end result is painful on the ears and devoid of any character and emotion. Give me the vocals of Emma Pollock any day, a voice where tricks and soaring registers are entirely absent. As a member of The Delgados, she brought such feeling to her songs, so that you really felt that the lyrics meant something to her. Her performance on Pull The Wires From the Wall is, in my mind, her greatest, a dragging sadness in the melody set against a stark background, never finding the need to yelp and groan like other female vocalists. Her voice is never plain, her vocals never dull – she somehow manages to fill the songs with expression whilst never resorting to dramatics.

Now a solo artist, her debut release Adrenaline was somewhat of a disappointment, a repetitively thumping piano stalling the song at any occasion where it started to get interesting. Thankfully, her second single Acid Test is a vast improvement, more in the spirit of her old band, a cross between the precision of Peloton and the more raucous sound of their debut. Breathy backing vocals unite with her own on the chorus, chiming guitars leading the song nicely back into the bridge.

Also good is A Temporary Fix, a more sedate affair at first with picked guitars and a single note piano. Her voice sounds more “folk” than usual, before the song rises into a collision of ideas towards the powerful end. Her debut album Watch the Fireworks is due out in the Autumn, and on the strength of this material looks like being something quite special.
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Links
Emma Pollock [official site] [myspace]