Most of these 12 songs in Revel In The Drama are still gorgeously uplifting: Ren Harvieu’s voice is as vividly beautiful as ever

Ren Harvieu                  Revel In The Drama                Bella Union, out Friday

Rating:

For a music lover, there’s nothing better than putting on a debut album by an unknown and realising that you’ve found a new favourite. And there are few things more frustrating than seeing them vanish without trace.

Ren Harvieu came breezing out of Salford in 2012 and reached the top five with Through The Night, an album of plush melodramatic pop. Aged 21, she had already been with Island Records for four years. 

The first time I saw her perform was in a backstreet dive in Brighton; the second, six months later, was at the Shepherd’s Bush Empire in London.

She looked like a goth, sang like a diva and even cracked dry jokes. ‘Really looking forward to making the next album,’ she told the London crowd. ‘I’m undecided whether it should be country or hip-hop.’

Then came nothing but the sound of silence. Dropped by Island, separated from her long-time lover, Harvieu went through ‘some very dark years’. Finally, in May 2019, she signed to Bella Union, which is good with gifted mavericks, as Island once was.

Now that album is here at last. It arrives just as millions of people are under house arrest. With the country in lockdown, the promotional tour, originally scheduled for next month, is a non-starter. 

There could hardly be a finer example of the difficult second album.

And yet, the minute you hear it, the difficulties melt away. Harvieu’s voice is as vividly beautiful as ever. She hasn’t gone country or hip-hop. She has stayed on her home turf, in the space between Dusty Springfield and David McAlmont. 

She still sings as if she’s wearing a ballgown and waving a cigarette holder.

IT'S A FACT 

Harvieu was discovered on the then popular social network MySpace. But while recording her first album, she broke her back.

Advertisement

The difference is that this time it’s more personal. These 12 songs, co-written by Romeo Stodart of The Magic Numbers, are postcards from a private hell. And most of them are still gorgeously uplifting.

From Friday, the album can be downloaded for a fiver on Apple Music, which makes it a steal as well as a treat.

Four tracks are already available to stream, including the teasing single Teenage Mascara, which Harvieu describes as ‘a dance between the many versions of ourselves… we can go from feeling like sultry sex kittens to being bedridden with despair and greasy hair’.

Marooned at home with our mood swings, many of us can relate to that, even if we’ve never been a sex kitten. It seems her timing isn’t so bad after all.