JESSIE WARE’S DANCE FEVER
The U.K. singer offers a euphoric survey of disco and house music
Jessie ware’s 2020 release, What’s Your Pleasure?, was one of the early pandemic’s great musical revelations — a pop album that successfully brought the movement, yearning, and euphoria of the dance club into everyone’s homes. It was a perfect setting for the British singer-songwriter’s voice, luxurious and sophisticated but still highly accessible.
Ware’s follow-up to that achievement, titled That! Feels Good!, further zeroes in on the many pleasures of dance music. Bodies and bodily sensations are emphasized, while inhibitions are shaken off in pursuit of personal and communal ecstasy. It’s also brighter and funkier than its predecessor, full of big brass and grooves that amplify the feeling of joy.
The title track — co-penned by Ware — opens with an orgy of breathy voices uttering the title phrase before transforming into a limber disco-funk jam somewhere between Prince and Stevie Wonder. “Just remember: Pleasure is a right,” Ware sings.
That’s a recurring theme throughout the album. On the single “Free Yourself,” Ware flips into disco-diva mode with an anthem of sexual liberation for queer and straight people alike. “Free yourself, keep on moving up that mountaintop/Why don’t you please yourself?” she sings. She seems to run the entire length of her considerable vocal range, belting the choruses and nodding to Donna Summer’s eternal “I Feel Love” as the song shifts from piano-driven disco to piano-driven house and then back again for its final vamp.
Sometimes Ware just embraces the feeling of being unabashedly horny. “Freak Me Now” opens with some porn-worthy moaning before turning into sticky electrofunk. On “Shake the Bottle,” she offers a sly instruction manual on how to get her off. And in the velvety disco tune “These Lips,” she describes a sensation of erotic intrigue: “These two lips could do so much more,” she purrs.
It’s certainly not overlong at 10 tracks, but That! Feels Good! does seem front-loaded with its punchiest tunes. Still, there are moments in the back half that really work, like the lithe, airy “These Lips” and the body-positive “Beautiful People,” which sounds like smoothed-out LCD Soundsystem.
The LP is at its best when it pinpoints the connection between body and emotion. “Begin Again” sounds like something out of the classic Salsoul catalog, with lush, choral melodies cascading through the groove. “Why does all the purest love get filtered through machines?” Ware wonders. It’s a plea for the kind of community only a dance floor can provide.