With Blasphemy So Heartfelt, And Tired

Not A Happy Bunny.

Jessica Lea Mayfield may look like a wee country poppet, but her songs are as weighty as an apathetic partner forced to waltz. At 23 she's a veritable connoisseur of misery - all perfectly okay for bluesy country, especially as there isn't a trace of bad teenage poetry, emotional aggrandisement, nor a misplaced quest for empathy. The girl is just plain miserable. She's not happy being sad; she just is.

She's also just released a new EP, 'Tell Me', but I'm behind the times and still caught up with 2008's 'With Blasphemy So Heartfealt'. 'Blasphemy...' is a break-up album that hits all the right notes and won't spare a single one extra. The sparsity of each track reigns in mawkish tendencies, and the sullen delivery is strangely evocative, despite its detachment. This is an album of lyrics churned from nights spent with eyes fixed upon a spot on the wall, and where fleeting western skies can be found in a few chords.

All in all, it's impressively bitter. The only problem is that listening to the whole thing in one go feels like being beaten over the head with a brick by someone who consistently sounds too bored by their own anger to care. However taken in little pieces it's a beautiful broken necklace of an album with gems that are burnished brightly. Mayfield is a talented soul, and one I suspect will be accompanying my night whiskies for some time to come.

• Jessica Lea Mayfield, Blasphemy So Heartfelt - Kiss Me Again
• Jessica Lea Mayfield, Blasphemy So Heartfelt - I Can't Lie To You
• Jessica Lea Mayfield, Blasphemy So Heartfelt - Bible Days