Celeste

★★★★ Not Your Muse BOTH SIDES/POLYDOR. CD/DL/LP

Accolade-magnet from Culver City via Brighton’s debut album.

The stentorian Sky Sports voiceover urges: Take Your Seat. While montaged galácticos like Jamie Vardy and Virgil Van Dijk do their day job, cucumber-cool 26-year-old, LA-born, Brightonraised chanteuse Celeste Epiphany Waite does hers – belting out stadium jazz-funk anthem Stop This Flame (“You’ll never stop this flame!”). Her debut, co-written with Rag’n’Bone Man producer Jamie Hartman, confirms her 2019 Rising Star Brit and BBC’s Sound Of 2020 awards were no fluke. The gossamer Strange finds Celeste’s smoky vocal sweet spot, where Adele and Corinne Bailey Rae connect to Nina Simone (whose Sinnerman is heavily sampled on pop monster …Flame), filling her immaculately strained, ethereal range. Skip the gooey self-penned A Little Love (John Lewis’ Christmas ad) to find a string section (A Kiss), birdsong (The Promise) and a holding pattern of vibes (Beloved). Tell Me Something I Don’t Know summons blue skies out of Phil Collins-grade old-soul. She’s in a league of her own.