In full respect of the four -year cadence, which since 2009 accompanies the publication, the sixth record chapter of the American singer -songwriter Valerie June arrives. “Owls, Omens and Oracle” is a decisive change of stylistic, but above all humoral change. The presence of M. Ward at the directorial desk breaks the set of folk, blues, soul, country and gospel that marked the previous albums. Already from the first hot notes of “Joy Joy” imprudence and determination take foot, with a incipit Garage-Rock that invites positivity, in the context of the owls, omens and bad oracles mentioned in the title of the disc.
In this creative euphoria the never dormant love for the lightness of the Motown style soul (“All I Really Wanna do”) are space, as well as an original momentum post-modern in the key Trap -du (“Superpower”).
Definitely more varied and less gloomy work of the previous ones, “Owls, Omens and Oracle” is a collection of sometimes ingeniously scruffy songs (the country of “Sweet Things Just for You”), where lonely ballads alternate with plane and sung out tone (“Trust The Path” and the soft rock scratches of “Inside Me”).
It is definitely the most immediate and pop album of Valerie, a celebration of life that passes through the call of the R&B (“Love Any Ole Way” roots) and Gospel (“Changed”) and consolidated old friends: the Blind Boys of Alabama in the aforementioned “Changes” and Norah Jones in “Sweet Things Just For You”.
In moving the waters in the roots of American music, Valerie June creates sweet and sour songs that look to the past with emphasis but without nostalgia (“endless tree”), touches the most intimate feelings with intensity and sweetness (“I'm in love”) and also in the least incisive episodes exhibits a long -lived simplicity and honesty (“Calling My Spirit”, “Missin 'You (Yeah, Yeah) “).
“Owls, Omens and Oracle” is in many ways the most standardized project of Valerie June, a successful attempt to get out of melancholy and the self -pity of much musical production today. A disk whose pleasantness is likely to offer a less intense and more fleeting creative profile, but also a demonstration of renewal capacity that is contagious and corroborating.
28/04/2025
Antonio Santini for SANREMO.FM
