Review by Paul Quinton

It’s been almost exactly a year since Heather Findlay left Mostly Autumn, where she graced the position of lead singer for 13 years, seeing the band grow from playing in pubs right up to headlining theatres. Her departure from the band was a shock at the time, although with hindsight, some of the creative tensions within the band have become more apparent. This, along with the problems of combining the fronting of a band that gigs regularly around the country with bringing up a young family, finally gave her the impetus to go her own way. As she put it herself at the time ‘if I didn’t do it now, then I never would, and I don’t think I was prepared to let that happen’.

This EP is to be the first of several such releases, each of which is intended to explore the various styles of music that have influenced her and which interest her now. She’s put together a very interesting looking band to help her along her journey: ex Mostly Autumn partner Chris Johnson (now fronting his own band Halo Blind) takes care of production and guitar, Dave Kilminster (Roger Waters, The Nice) also plays guitar, while Steve Vantsis (Fish) is on bass and session man Alex Cromarty takes care of drumming duties.

I trust no one starts to listen to this expecting what she herself described as ‘Heather Findlay’s Mostly Autumn’, because they’re going to be disappointed. There’s very little trace of the lush arrangements of her former band, as this is largely a comparatively basic guitar, bass and drums sound. There isn’t even a keyboard player identified in the credits, although Chris Johnson is described as being responsible for  ‘programming’, and most of the textures and arrangements seem to be created from the various guitars, reminding me in some ways of a certain R.Plant in his Strange Sensation days.

Opener ‘Red Dust’ begins with a very sparse arrangement, with just an acoustic guitar and Heather’s voice, and as if to emphasise that Mostly Autumn are firmly in her past, she opens the song by singing in a significantly lower register than we’ve become used to. However as the CD goes on, it strikes me that the arrangements become fuller, not only during the course of the individual songs, but also through the CD itself. As co-arrangers and producers, Heather and Chris Johnson have also put the CD together very cleverly, ensuring that you have to listen either very carefully or a number of times to pick out everything that’s going on.

The second song ‘Phoenix’ also opens comparatively gently, with a more ethereal vocal, before the song proper begins. Stevie Nicks has long been one of her influences and there are definite traces of that influence here, although the lyrics are much darker than I can remember Nicks ever singing, and this leads nicely to ‘Cellophane’. This may be the shortest track on the EP, but it’s also perhaps the most ambitious, having several individual themes, as well as a terrific middle-8 and a cracking chorus, not to mention some even more startlingly dark, even sinister, lyrics.

‘Seven’ is a slower, more atmospheric track, but in keeping with the rest of the CD, builds up to a big chorus and a bigger finale. It’s the one song that is closest to having an ‘epic’ feel, but it’s the final track, ’Mona Lisa’, that is the one that comes closest to the work of her old band, but yet with that different, almost alt.rock twist.

The EP was first made available in a limited edition of 100 copies, for which Heather’s original artwork for the album was divided into 100 postcard sized pieces to form the cover for the CD, accompanied by a personal message from the lady herself. Unless you’re prepared to look on e-bay, don’t bother trying to order one, as the sole pressing sold out in a mere 9 minutes when it was made available on her website. But even without the added extras, this is still a very nicely packaged piece of work. It’s also a very challenging first solo effort and Heather hasn’t taken the easy option of harking back to the more popular phases of her earlier career. Maybe it’s not quite the home run that her fans might have been hoping for, and perhaps there’s nothing with the immediacy or epic nature of her finest Mostly Autumn moments. A lot of people might not get this on first listen, but it really is well worth the effort of staying with it, and looking deeper into the songs. From a personal point of view, it’s great to hear her again, and having listened to her first CD, I really am looking forward to seeing her on stage with this music.

http://www.heatherfindlay.net/

Not long after the EP was released, Heather donated the proceeds of 24 hours sales of the CD to the Trembling Madness appeal which is working to raise awareness and money in aid of the victims of the Japanese tsunami disaster. If you would like to know more about the appeal, or would like to make a donation, please follow the link below.