Joy Crookes

★★★★ Skin INSANITY. CD/DL/LP

Immersive debut from the 22-year-old BangladeshiIrish south Londoner.

Joy Crookes was raised on Sarah Vaughan, Dinah Washington and Ella Fitzgerald records and her raspy vocal is perfect for low-lit smokefilled jazz establishments. As such, she has earned comparisons to Amy Winehouse and, like Amy, she speaks her mind, her songs traversing identity, familial love, civil rights and relationship power struggles are delivered with a fierce honesty and intensity. “I’m not your lover, I’m just for Friday nights,” she sings matter-offactly on I Don’t Mind, a hazy layering of beats, strings and horns, played by a brass section plied with whisky so they sound drunk. Elsewhere, on the Nina Simone-styled ballad Power, she declares defiantly, “I don’t need your permission.” Recorded in Abbey Road with co-producer Blue May, Skin takes in soul, jazz and trip-hop, and more than fulfils her early promise. Lois Wilson