Nat Johnson – Dirty Rotten Soul EP

Are you familiar with Monkey Swallows The Universe? An odd question, but largely because of the presence of the Sheffield-based band's unusual name. When that group disbanded after releasing a pair of albums, one of their key members, Nat Johnson, began to embark upon a solo career. Dirty Rotten Soul, a four-song EP, is the first released output of that solo project.The title track is an energetic country-tinged shuffle, built largely around the drums and twangly guitar, and with a memorable, lush chorus - "leave your wife, play some rock n' roll, take me to the roller disco..."The other songs are even more pure showcases for Johnson's voice (I'll add at this point that we're not related - there's no familial bias here, no sir!), especially "Mexico", on which her only accompaniment consists of a plodding acoustic guitar and sprinklings of atmospheric electric guitar notes. It's a much more sombre affair than the first track, and brings the pace right down. The other two songs here, "Heart of Clay" and "Judy's First Beat" are actually demos - something that made me very skeptical about them before I first heard them - but I needn't have worried or felt shortchanged, because "Heart of Clay" in particular is a very strong song, and doesn't anywhere near as unpolished as you might expect, certainly not in a negative way. Even though the arrangements here are fairly spare, Johnson's voice seems to fill all the available space - it is expansive, warm and versatile.Like so many EPs, Dirty Rotten Soul suffers from simply not being able to cover enough ground. But as an introduction to this new solo talent, it more than suffices, and is definitely worth a listen. 76%Nat Johnson on MySpace