Delilah’s blend of sultry soul pop has become a pretty regular feature on Breaking More Waves so we figure it’s time for some more. Inside My Love was originally performed by Minnie Ripperton, best known for the classic Lovin’ You which reached no.2 in the UK charts back in 1975. It’s such a shame that Lovin’ You was Ripperton’s only UK hit, blessed as she was with such a wonderful voice, but she died in 1979 of breast cancer at the young age of just 31, a life and a talent cut tragically short. When your ears are first caressed by the original of Inside My Love, you’d have to hate music to not admit that it is an exquisite and really rather sexy late-night song. If you’ve never heard it, give yourself a valuable education in beauty by clicking here.
Maybe now Delilah can bring further recognition to this wonderful song with this honey coated recording. “You can see inside me, will you come inside me, do you wanna ride inside my love?,” she seductively asks and frankly if she was singing this to us, we’d find it difficult to say no.
Delilah’s album From The Roots Up will be released on 30 July.
‘The industry’s best-kept secret’ was how Delilah was first described on Breaking More Waves. Even though at that time we queried that description's accuracy there’s no doubt that since then if she was a secret, that’s been blown wide open. Her single Go has now sold over 150,000 copies having spent a number of weeks floating around the UK singles chart. She’s also released 2 -4am an 8-track collection that features unreleased tracks, including Joe Goddard's remix of her second single Love You So.
Now Delilah is releasing Breathe – revamped from the original version that we posted when we first introduced you to her - with her debut album proper From The Roots Up following in summer 2012. Undeniably referencing early Massive Attack this new version of Breathe remains seductive and soulful as Delilah sings of “this wonderful punishment called life.” If it wasn’t for the lyrics “I can hate what you say and still smile,” for example, this would be wonderful come to bed music. Delilah - Breathe (2012 Version)
Delilah’s Chaka Khan referencing Go (first featured in these quarters back in August) has become one of the sleeper hits of autumn in the UK. With just the right amount of radio exposure and tours with the likes of Chase & Status and Maverick Sabre, she’s become a real commercial proposition without having been burdened with the weight of hype and expectation. It’s a difficult line for an artist to straddle – over exposure can so quickly lead to backlash, but Delilah seems to have got it just right.
So now it’s time for some new material. With lyrics about loneliness, falling apart, being left lost and ‘pointing a gun towards my oldest friend’ Love You So may not quite be the happily romantic pop nugget that you might expect from the title. Musically it bears fruit as a classy string-laden mid-tempo piece of excellence, giving the strongest suggestion that Delilah will soon be finding her way to the radio-waves again.
You know Delilah don’t you? No not the Tom Jones one, the other one. No? Well maybe not, because according to her facebook page she’s ‘the industry’s best-kept secret’, which is a bit of a strange thing to say considering that there are already plenty of web postings about her and a You Tube stream of her song Breathe has already received 84,000 views. If she’s a secret, those views are the size of Wembley Stadium whispering but getting louder all the time. Yet when we did a little asking around a handful of the more well established new music bloggers, none of them had heard of Delilah. So maybe she’s a secret after all, or maybe the blogs haven’t got their ears as close to the ground as you may think (for close to the ground read that they haven’t been contacted by the artist or their PR company yet), or maybe she’s just not very ‘bloggable’ in that her sound isn’t underground enough for the majority of blogs, or maybe we just asked the wrong bloggers, or maybe we're wrong and she's actually rubbish so bloggers don't care. Except us. Because we care. We care enough to write these few words during our summer holiday, when we shouldn't be posting blogs. If David Cameron has to be called back off his holiday whilst his country riots and loots and Obama has to shorten his because of Hurricane Irene, it's more than appropriate for us to take some time away from the beach to bring good new music to your attention.
So here’s our small attempt to blow the lid on this ‘secret’, that is if you haven’t heard Delilah before. Chances are you have, but just haven’t clocked the name yet, as she’s been working with Chase & Staus (we’re streaming their song Time below which features her vocal and to be fair is listed on a whole load of music blogs) but now she’s about to set out on her solo career. In fact she already has an album fully recorded and ready to go, which will be released at the beginning of next year.
So what does she sound like? (We'll keep this short because nobody wants to read paragraphs of verbose description of what the music sounds like when they can just press play and make their own judgements do they?)
Delilah’s songs are perfectly nailed urban mini anthems of sedateness swimming around in a dark pop undercurrent. That sounds a bit wanky, but it's true. There’s a strong similarity here to another Breaking More Waves featured artist Jess Mills, who has worked with dance producers (in her case Breakage) before venturing out on her own. Her vocals are top notch, all breathy and suggestive but with a restrained power. Listening to the fluttering mellow vibes of the Chakha Khan referencing Go we’re reminded of the likes of Sia, Massive Attack and Portishead in terms of atmosphere, or maybe Katy B in bed with Leftfield as does the string laden Breathe which you can download for free below. There’s upbeat stuff as well, such as Layby which you can listen to here, but we suggest that it’s these sultry, late night modern ballads that are the most effective. Now go listen.
