Sophie Ellis-Bextor
Wanderlust

Three years after the flashy "Make a Scene", which was only appealing in its cover art, the British singer Sophie Ellis-Bextor returns to the music scene, kicking off 2014 with a new musical project, "Wanderlust", which marks a decisive turning point in her artistic career: setting aside the synthesizers and dance chart-toppers (consistently and unfairly ignored in favor of colleagues with highly questionable talent), the beautiful vocalist challenges herself with an indie-pop album with Nordic and refined sounds, as well as recorded exclusively with "real" instruments.

Let's be clear, it's not an innovative work nor one that will be remembered in the annals of music history, but it's certainly gratifying to see a pop star, until now noticed more for her beauty than for her real artistic-musical capabilities (which have always been there), prove to have quite a few neurons in her head unlike other undeservedly more famous singers. Parting ways with Universal Music and definitively joining EBGB's, she, with the help of composer Ed Harcourt, embraces Nordic and folkloric sounds in a blend of strings, guitars, and drums, which, together with Sophie's velvety and commanding voice, create a dreamlike atmosphere with very suggestive retro nuances, grandly introduced by the majestic orchestral pop-rock of "Birth of An Empire." What follows is a pleasant alternation of sweet ballads ("Runaway Daydreamer", "Young Blood", and the acoustic "When the Storm Has Blown Over") and delicately dark moments ("Wrong Side of The Sun", "Until the Stars Collide"), with the addition of some enjoyable and substantial incursions into Eastern European folk ("Love is A Camera", "The Deer & The Wolf"), as well as a surprising and successful rock experimentation (the gritty and charming "13 Little Dolls"). The whole is then crowned by well-written lyrics and arrangements that are always refined, never trivial nor intrusive, and sometimes almost minimalist (especially in "Cry to the Beat of The Band", the most experimental track of the batch, and the only one that includes electronic sounds).

Sure, as I mentioned before, we are not faced with anything innovative or particularly original and perhaps daring a little more might have given "Wanderlust" that extra something that distinguishes a pleasant album from one of outstanding quality, but the album is overall a more than enjoyable listen and the path Sophie has taken seems to be the right one for her, who, if she manages to evolve well in the writing and composing of tracks, might also offer us some pleasant surprises in the future. 

Rating: 3.5