For this week’s Song Lyric Sunday Jim has invited us to play some music from 2020 or later. You can read about it in his post, Not Old Enough To Grow Hair. I thought about playing one of the artists I’ve been following for years, who happen to have released new music recently, but I’ve chosen to go with someone whose first record came out just six years ago. I think she is fantastic, though I’d lay odds that no one reading this will know her, unless they remember the two previous occasions on which I’ve shared one of her songs. Just get a load of this voice:

Lyrics for her songs aren’t widely available, and this is one of the few for which I could find some. They run:

Running on empty
Ploughing desolate lands
Well ran dry
Still we drown in the silence
While the blood runs from your hands
Poets and preachers
Left in the cold
Ain’t no margin in feeding a family
From the farming of your soul
So sing yourself to sleep

Turn turn turn
World keeps a turning
Deal us scraps
From your silver spoon
Burn Burn Burn
Songs on the Fire
Carried on the smoke
To the Cheats and the Liars
Turn turn turn
World keeps a turning
Revolution
Coming through
Burn Burn Burn
Warmed by the pyre
Sing another song
For the Cheats and the Liars

Songwriters: Elles Bailey, Ashton Tucker

Copyright: Outlaw Music

Having played that for you, I think I should give Elles Bailey a proper introduction, with some background information. Elles (short for Eleanor) is from Bristol in the UK, and has a notable back story. At the age of 2 she was hospitalised with a severe case of viral pneumonia and spent seventeen days – including her third birthday – with a breathing tube down her throat. Happily she survived that ordeal mostly unscathed, but she has credited, if that is the right word, her singing voice to that experience: “I know how fortunate I am to have walked away with that husky voice. And my life.” She has won several awards here for her music, and has to date released five albums. She tours extensively and is, I think, one of the hardest working performers around. I follow her on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and she is one of those artists who really enjoys the interaction with fans that these give her. I’ve not met her, but I know someone who has: apparently she is a lovely person, very welcoming and friendly. This song is the opening track on her most recent album, Shining In The Half Light, which was originally released in February 2022 but was given the Deluxe treatment, with an additional nine tracks, in March of this year. It reached #42 in the UK Albums Chart, peaked at #1 in the UK Jazz and Blues Albums Chart, at #2 in the UK Americana Albums Chart and at #4 in the UK Independent Albums Chart.

I thought I’d play you a second song by Elles. This is one of the additional tracks that was added to that album in March, and I think it is equally good. This was co-written with Matt Owens, from the UK indie band Noah and the Whale, and gives you another chance to hear those great vocals of hers, and this time you get to see her fabulous band and sassy backing vocalists too:

I’ve become a big fan of Elles since I first heard her music some years back, and I hope these two songs will show you why. If you like these, do check her out further: everything she has done is superb.

That’s it for today. I’m off to see what others are playing for their relatively new music choices: it should be interesting. See you again for Tuesday Tunes 😊🎶