Reviewed by Tony Cummings

Anyone going along to see Martyn Joseph's live appearances with Joan Armatrading could be forgiven for asking why Christendom has failed to produce a singer/songwriter with the passion and elegance of that lady. Maybe they have now. For the album debut of this lass from Los Angeles has many of the hallmarks of Arma-trading's finest - the same acoustic based rhythms with their undulating hints of Latin, jazz and African, the same skilled phrasing using chunks of syllables to create deliciously lazy rhythms and the same way with imagery taking the listener on a guided tour of the human condition. Currently my favourites are a rock-funk opus "A City On A Hill" with a girl chorus coming on like the Raelettes and the moodily atmospheric "Lies (That I Have Known)" but everywhere there are new delights, while the playing from the likes of super-sessioner Dean Parks and ex-Eagle Bernie Leadon is nothing short of superlative.