Sugar Honey is the follow up to the last solo long player from Carla J. Easton from three years ago, Weirdo. With the interim period including an album release from her Poster Paints project with ex-Frightened Rabbit, Simon Liddell, time has been good to Carla in terms of creativity, Sugar Honey is a continuation of that seam of inspired creativity, the album a formidable statement of intent on several fronts.
Sugar Honey is a bit of a double-edged sword. The album title describes Carla’s music perfectly, a flawless blend of her sugary sweet synth/keys-based pop melodies, that never become mawkish and cloying, matched with her unique honey-coated voice, dripping with that feeling of familiar warming vocal hug, and the addition of a heavy measure of both melancholy and ire… Which is the other side of the double-edged sword.
Don’t let the melodies fool you into thinking everything here is all sweetness and light. This album features powerful messages here from a fiercely independent woman, particularly on the title track. Having been fortunate to have heard some of these songs performed live in the Hug and Pint as part of their Summer Sessions series, Carla made it very clear where the messages for these songs came from. At the time semi-joking about the impact of an ex and taking herself off to foreign shores, but closer to home being deadly serious about the unwanted attention from men making women feeling unsafe while walking the streets of Glasgow at night. The actions and excuses of men summed up in the indignant line “I didn’t mean to make you want me, please don’t ever touch my body,” Carla is not a woman to be messed with.
The album begins and ends with a sense of melancholy, Never Belong perhaps linking back to some of the messages delivered in Weirdo, while the album ends in style with an understated beautiful sadness and grace and reflective lyrics on the string bolstered magnificence of Sleepyhead As well as the strings on Sleepyhead, the addition of saxophone adds an extra layer of texture to several of the songs on the album, and gives a real 80’s feel to the songs concerned. Does it sound mad to say that penultimate song Weekend Lover channels the music of Purple Rain era Prince meets Local Hero?
This 80’s feel is particularly present with the addition of the saxophone to the synth/electronic beats on One Week, where Carla ruminates on a relationship doomed to failure “Oh oh, here we go again” she muses. Relationship endings feature heavily, with the multi layered emotional instrumentation on Every Little Bit of My Heart soundtracking another reflection, this time on how the relationships start “This is how it all begins…” the final line sung with almost a sense of resignation.
Sugar Honey is a triumph both musically and lyrically, don’t hesitate to get your hands on a copy.
If you’re on Glasgow’s Southside on Friday 20th (album release day) head to Some Great reward for a live instore between 5 and 8pm.