Happy 10th Anniversary to Jamie Woon’s debut album Mirrorwriting, originally released April 18, 2011.
When Londoner Jamie Woon released his debut album Mirrorwriting in 2011, much coverage focused on what he, or it, wasn’t—such as Kitty Empire’s review for The Guardian. Time was spent trying to categorize his music in order to slot it into the right lists and hands, instead of accepting it for what it was.
The roots of this frustrating approach lie in his initial introduction to the music world. In 2007, he had released a cover of the old American folk spiritual song “Wayfaring Stranger” and had it remixed by Burial, the reclusive, yet enormously influential electronic artist whose work was prominent in the development of dubstep. The song saw him framed as being ready to launch an entirely new subgenre of bass driven, electronic music.
But it took four years for Woon to have an album ready, by which time James Blake and others had stolen in to receive plaudits and sales that some assumed Woon stood ready to take, leaving him to look like he was a follower rather than the leader some had identified. Consequently, many reviews focused on where he fitted into the landscape rather than accepting the album at face value.
Of course, it would have been a lot simpler to listen to the album or the artist himself. In an interview with the BBC in 2011, he said “. . . at the heart of what I do is R&B; it’s groove based, vocal-led music.” Sometimes on Mirrorwriting those founding features are slightly obscured by the electronic backdrop, a backdrop that would often be showcased in a live setting by recording backing vocals and percussion and looping them to sing on top of, as countless others have done since (Alicia Keys, for example).
Two things are immediately apparent as the album progresses. Firstly, that the bones of the writing have, as Woon himself put it, a soulful, R&B template and that he has the vocal skills to pull them off with some aplomb. And secondly, that he has an ear for melody that some of the others he gets bracketed with don’t. Whereas Blake appears to meander in search of memorable melodies, Woon’s work finds them and displays them front and center.
There are a couple of threads that run through the production on the album. The backing vocals often take an eerie, ghostly quality that complements his doleful voice perfectly. It's a voice that revels in disappointment and understated heartbreak, but with enough soul to cut through the slightly icy disconnect that permeates the musical accompaniment. Opener “Night Air” is a good example of the approach to backing vocals. They are muted, fade in and out of affairs and add to the pervading sense of gloominess, without detracting from the comforting elements of the song.
Additionally, the production sometimes hides the elements that might make its soulful undercurrents more apparent. Nowhere is that more obvious than on album closer “Waterfront,” where the sanctified soulful sound of an organ lurks beneath the acoustic strumming and the cautious optimism of the vocals. With the odd tweak here and there, the musical DNA of the album would have been more readily available to those who sought to categorize it at the time of release.
In between those bookends lie countless reasons to love this wonderful debut album. The almost 2-step of “Street” with its throb of dampened bass and light funk leads into the funkier still snap of the snare on “Lady Luck,” as he bemoans the lack of favor from the fates: “Sometimes I wish could anesthetize / Bring up the lows, bring down the highs / She is the one I need to sympathize / She is the one who sees me cry.”
The same baleful quality runs through “Shoulda,” in lines such as, “Walked when I shoulda run / And I ran when I shoulda walked / And don’t I know it.” His rueful reflection fits his voice so perfectly, that it’s hard to imagine how he’d cope with being happy and the bass at the mid-song breakdown lends another layer of rumination to the proceedings.
Further evidence of the soul roots of Woon’s work lie in a vocal run during “Middle.” As the strings build up towards the end of the song, he cascades down the line “center of a laser beam” in a meltingly delicious way—proof for those with open ears and minds of his R&B leanings.
Another reason to love the album is the beat drop of “Spirits.” The familiarly eerie backing vocals begin proceedings before the beat kicks in to great effect. His slide up into his higher register is a joy to behold too.
“Spiral” has cute keyboard lines to start off before a “boom-clack” that wouldn’t be out of place on Erykah Badu’s Baduizm (1997) takes over at a stately pace. But there are the faint wobbles of electronic bass and even more distant sounding strings to make a subtle piece of narrative about relationships fizzing out: “Well we bathe in the living room lamplight / Casting shadows on the walls that have heard these sighs before / I don’t know if it’s over / I guess the years just made us older.”
The tempo changes with “Tmrw,” as it is the most up-tempo song on the album with some affecting counter melodies to soften the downbeat feelings he shares about struggling to get through tomorrows every day. Then the gear shifts again with the slow burn of “Gravity.”
The delights of this album are many and it’s awkward placing at its time of release is an abject lesson in ignoring the white noise that often accompanies the release of albums, particularly for those with heightened levels of “buzz” around them. Sometimes expectation weighs heavy on listeners’ minds and they fail to see what is in front of them. We’ve all been there and this is definitely an album that has benefitted from the reappraisal made possible by the passage of time.
LISTEN: