Long Live the Angels

Her return is lucid and uncluttered, placing all the expressiveness of her voice at its center.

Certain listeners might bemoan the shortage of uptempo belters here, but one attentive and thorough listen presents a clear justification.

Not that the usual soul belters are entirely absent from Long Live The Angels. Tracks like “Every Single Little Piece” and “Highs & Lows” are big, radio-friendly chartbound anthems, ebullient and eager to please; but the more interesting aspects of the album are to be found in less formulaic arrangements, such as “Give Me Something”, which opens with an acoustic guitar flourish pointedly recalling “The Tracks Of My Tears”, before settling into a folk-soul setting clearly influenced by Tracy Chapman.

Subtlety isn't a typical pop virtue, but it suits Sande.

Her penchant for ceiling-shattering pop notwithstanding, the LP also lets Sandé close the curtains and flex her voice in more intimate boudoirs, just a few instruments, and her heartache to keep her company.

Sande's second album doesn't always sound quite so revelatory [as her debut]: anguished intensity often masks a lack of musical spark, the draggy acoustic trawl of Give Me Something sounding like her namesake Adele at her least bothered. She is much more engaging when she operates at full-grown throttle. [Jan 2017, p.113]

A repetitive wash of acoustic guitars and consoling choirs dull the emotion, and Sandé is too polite to go for the jugular.

Sandé clearly has the chops to stand out in the sophisticated cross-platform arms race of modern pop music--the soaring ‘Shakes’ and ‘Sweet Architect’ are proof of that--but you still wish she didn’t fall back so readily on cliché.

Parts of this album creep even closer to the middle of the road: whisper-to-a-scream ballads such as Happen are interesting only for their vastness.