Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

You can only imagine what goes in the minds of musicians before the On-Air sign goes to red, the dawning realisation that this is the moment in which to shine or even fall, the many questions that buzz like pregnant Queen Bees and spawning more and more self-interrogations and pricking the conscience in their own self-defence.

The On-Air light goes on and that instant the artist realises that whatever happens next, they can only give their best. As an outsider that process you can only hazard a guess to the emotions but in the lyrics, the small trembling voice which is hidden deeply in perhaps just a single word or large expression catches your eye and you know that the artist has poured out their soul. This is arguably what you find when listening to Lexie Green’s superb debut album Breathe.

Inhale the sound, gasp at the feeling of listening to somebody perform something so beautiful that any doubts that may have lingered about sharing these songs with the wider world are soon diminished and most of all, play with the thought that Lexie Green in just over six years she has gone from somebody who had perhaps looked at a guitar and wondered just what the attraction may have been to somebody whose musical company is not just lauded but requested with authority.

Breathe is poised, measured and sophisticated. It has the dignity of a woman who is placing her trust for the first time in something new and yet knowing deep inside that it will be accepted for what it is, an album in which to really immerse yourself into without all pretence or pretension of some her more established fellow musical travellers.

With tracks such as the opener Frozen Photographs which clings to the memory like an ancient lithograph hanging loosely on somebody’s mantle-piece, the excellent Born This Way in which the outpouring of understanding is so passionate, so untamed, it makes the hairs on the back of your neck feel as if they have stood in a wind tunnel for a few hours and the exceptional No Rainbows have the growing sentiment of needing to be played at least once a day just to really hold the desire as close as possible and for as long as the musician will allow.

The biggest surprise might be that you discover it is a debut album, for surely something as sweet, crushingly beautiful and straight forward as Breathe can only have been imagined by somebody with many of experience in recording may have thought of.  Don’t just inhale the smell of beauty; drink it in, savour the taste for Lexie Green will surely offer so much in time.

Breathe is released on Fifty Road Records.

Ian D. Hall