The initial impression of the lead single and title track from the first album Natasha Khan has released in 5 years, was that it was a little too atmospheric, I wanted something with more bones to it. So I was shocked to find that it's actually one of the album's less meandering expanses of sound. In many ways, this album is not unlike Kate Bush's "50 Words" for Snow, but I expect more from Khan than the spoken word minimalism of "Christmas Day". I get having a baby is life-changing But if I was her daughter and mom wrote me a song like "Letter to My Daughter" I would think "Why didn't mom write me more of a slapper.
There is more piano than percussion, which if you are Kate Bush or Tori Amos works, but that is not one of Khan's strong suits. It is not like she did not have a mellower side. Perhaps some of the darker feelings have shifted with having a kid, not my experience, but perhaps it is hers. This does not excuse just drifting around with little focus and putting it on an album knowing it is not going to live up to your other work. This is the soundtrack for when someone says "Since I had kids, I lost all my friends because I do not feel like going out anymore". I would hope post-partum depression would sound darker. it is spacing out in a listless manner.
The first song that has more form and function and works for what she does is "Home". She does drag some sounds from the 80s to play with them on "Breaking Up" which John Tesh would find compelling, I can at least appreciate more as the melody goes somewhere. These bleed over into "Delphi Dancing" Her voice takes on a more siren-like wail into the ether. This fades into a piano piece with little dynamic payoff. The album begins to drift off until the synths of the final song. There are cool sounds that never really turn into much of a song. I will round this one down to a 5.5 since I know what she is capable of.
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