Chrissie Hynde With The Valve Bone Woe Ensemble

Valve Bone Woe

The Pretenders’ fearless leader goes jazz-dub on second solo album. The jazz or standards cover version record has already been a later career diversion for the likes of Paul McCartney and Rod Stewart, but it’s a surprising choice for the perennially rocking Chrissie Hynde. Citing the formative influence of her jazz-loving brother when growing up in Akron, Ohio, here, over tastefully imaginative orchestral arrangements, she wraps her velvet vibrato around Hoagy Carmichael’s I Get Along Without You Very Well (Except Sometimes) and Sinatra’s I’m A Fool To Want You. It’s pleasant but ultimately inessential stuff. Way better are the tunes where the tape echo effects kick in – particularly on dubtastic takes on Brian Wilson’s Caroline, No and former beau Ray Davies’s desperately lonesome No Return.