Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
If the word division has been on people’s lips of late, it could be seen as understandable. Everywhere you care to look, no matter what side you feel you are either urged to take or come too of your own research and accord, division is everywhere. It is in every fabric of society and seems so deeply engrained that even if a nation or family votes in a majority in favour of something, the arguments it has caused are going to live long in the memory.
Grudges can be kept for decades and further splits always seem inevitable. From the group of near feral teenagers hanging around on the corner with one eye out for the police to the struggling jobbing artist constantly and with bile and venom told they have no concept of what it means to work hard and be part of the real world, division is something that as species we seem to be true masters at.
Perhaps something all can agree upon is Niamh Jones. Like so many of her age group, those that have come before and those that will inevitably come hurtling along afterwards, the young woman pours her emotions, dreams and desires, her evaluation of certain subjects, their limitations and restraints to her, her generation and too society as a whole and comes up with a set of songs on her debut E.P. that just thrill the heart and set a standard in which the hard work to come will surely have a solid base in which to grow.
Listening to the three tracks Niamh Jones has put out into this so called real world, a world where destruction and demolition are somehow just as lauded as the art of creativity and finding a purpose in life aside from being a statistic, a firmly wedged box in which you find most despairing souls, and she blasts that box wide open. A 17 year old woman who has found the courage to have a voice and not afraid, like so many young women in music in the city of Liverpool who also show exactly what they are made of, Me And Deboe, Natalie McCool, Mersey Wylie, Jo Bywater for example and gives a sweet smile, a demure glance and two firmly placed and rigid fingers into the darkening September nights towards those who say such things cannot be done.
Whether the sturdy beginning of Tracks, the superb Self Analysis or the beauty that resides in Cloud Head, Niamh Jones captures the words determination and spirit off perfectly. As a lover of music you cannot help but wonder where this young woman will go from this point but you can be sure that whatever she does it will be with vigour and optimism, a great combination in the hands of someone not afraid to walk between the dividing line and pick up those fallen along the way.
Ian D. Hall