- Jamie Woon can sing, and that's the most important thing you need to know about him. He could sing his shopping list and I'd be swooning all the same. Although his dubstep-gone-pop trajectory aligns him with James Blake or Katy B, the fellow Londoner has a sound too hooky for the former and too withdrawn for the latter, and he's more rooted in soul than either. Woon's debut album Mirrorwriting is, like Blake's, a bona fide solo album, a hushed and isolated world where every sound comes from either his throat or the machines at his fingertips. Think garage-tinged synth pop with full-throated R&B vocals.
Woon's production is suitably nocturnal, and for its first half Mirrorwriting is a solitary walk through the deserted city night, hinting at his past working with dubstep producers like Burial (who co-produces "Night Air"), Subeena and Ramadanman. The understated instrumentals are an excellent showcase for his singing, making tiny details (the perfectly-placed synth chords on "Street") that invade the perfectly rendered frigidity all the more powerful. One particular trick you'll hear a few times: Woon weaving vocals into stunning choral arrangements. It happens to uproarious effect on the blue-eyed soul of "Lady Luck," and is just as affectingly nervous and tense on "Spirits." When the multiple Woons mesh with the whisper-quiet percussion and gentle chords, it's often irresistibly sleek, futurist in sound and suavely retro in execution.
It's when that stylized production suddenly vanishes that the album suffers, and following the triumphant "Spirits," Mirrorwriting begins to spiral downward into open-mic night fare. Tracks like "Spirals" and "Gravity" traverse territory dangerously reminiscent of John Mayer, particularly as his vocals become breathier and less layered. Woon's songwriting is at the least serviceable, but his songs just don't carry the same water without that little bit of the hardcore continuum flowing through them.
By the time the all-acoustic closer "Waterfront" reluctantly half-opens its groggy eyes, you're left wondering if this is the same record that began with the haunting garage gospel of "Night Air," and if Woon is really just a decent singer getting undue attention because of a few lucky associations. But even where he flounders it's hard to begrudge him, and with his debut album he's given us something that's brilliant half the time, and so very listenable even when it's not. After all, Jamie Woon can sing, and that's the most important thing you need to know about him. For now, anyway.
Tracklist 01. Night Air
02. Street
03. Lady Luck
04. Shoulda
05. Middle
06. Spirits
07. Echoes
08. Spiral
09. TMRW
10. Secondbreath
11. Gravity
12. Waterfront