Review of ‘What Are The Odds’, Jorja Smith’s new album
Jorja Smith recover all your cockiness with this “What Are The Odds”his third studio album, a new step in a career full of successes and brilliant collaborations. “What Are The Odds” intends to put one and a half feet on the dance floor. Smith’s more r&b profile does not disappear, but she lies down and transfers her sensual energy to a handful of songs that the singer intended to be celebrated while moving her skeleton. The point is that this is achieved, but in a particular way. In most of the minutes it is not the beats that will make you move, but rather the base synthesizers that, with their own brilliance, elevate almost all of these songs.
You will dance in a Zen way, even if the rhythms are intricate and baroque: the percussions have a good basis in genres such as grime, UK garage or even dubstep from the beginning of the century. Without going any further, “For Life”the cut that inaugurates the thing seems like a theme from “Untrue” from Burial, but without the afterlife filters that made the faceless producer famous.
The fact that this album is produced by P2J (Beyoncé, Stormzy, Burna Boy) is part of Smith’s idea of this being an album of celebration, of community, of dance, something that is also noticeable in the rest of the production team: people who have worked with Chase & Status and Calvin Harris, among many others. Also worth noting is the fact that the songs average almost all three minutes. Guaranteed anti-boredom measure.
As we said, most of the songs show programming that is also indebted to drum’n’bass and the contagious pulse takes over everything; for the third topic “What’s Done Is Done” The best of Smith’s particular tone of voice comes out, which leaves her in a place of distinction in a busted industry of generic products.
There is a formula in this first part of the album that works perfectly: those gloomy keyboards as a base, low synthesizers, some little samples there. Moderately raver spirit, contemporary heart, and very British. The collaboration with Devlin also fits well in that nomenclature, “This City.”
The sound concept is everything here because although the songs are accomplished – although they are not very different from each other – the play of the crossed percussions with their filters and changes of intention make listening enjoyable. I’m not sure that these songs are just as effective if we strip them down to an acoustic ballad level, but that’s not the way Smith makes them reach us either.
In this fluid and pleasant passage with the occasional discreet passage, the high appears: “I Lied, You Lied” an afro-house with half-closed eyes“Young Heart” between the biomechanical and the seduction a la Sade. About the end of the album, starting with “Alive” (along with Wizkid) Smith’s wishes come true because this is an exquisite slow dancehall that delivers a necessary heart-beat kick. “Make It Your Home” treads homely ground, raising the party bar even higher. With the balance delivered by this final stretch of the album, we can confirm that we are facing the most conceptually and musically interesting album by the Englishwoman.
