Michael Kiwanuka
Small Changes
★★★★
POLYDOR
Twice during his spellbinding set on the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury this summer Michael Kiwanuka attempted to perform the intro to Solid Ground, the penultimate track on his last album Kiwanuka, before his malfunctioning synth forced him to abandon the song. “This is like my worst nightmare,” he sheepishly grinned, before quickly recomposing himself and seamlessly carrying on. But it was a glimpse of the diffident, anxious man – a self-confessed “overthinker” – so often apparent in his songs.
Five years have passed since that Mercury-winning third album and this long-gestated successor reflects the hopes and fears of a 37-year-old father of two now living on the English south coast having quit his native London. If the singer has always been confessional, even when he’s gently fretting it now comes with life experience and some sagacity. Made once again with the production team of Danger Mouse and Inflo, Kiwanuka says the latter in particular helps to top up his self-confidence and stop him second-guessing himself.
“We can be solid but barely make a dent,” he offers in gorgeous, slow-burning opener Floating Parade, with its Melody Nelson bassline, wafting strings, and oblique narrative involving a desire to lose himself in the crowd and kill his anxiety. “I chased the waterfalls/I was the leaving kind,” he sings elsewhere, with a hint of Fred Neil-styled escapism, in One And Only, a song that’s ultimately about resolving to be a better partner.
Though there aren’t any drastic changes to his warm, woody sound, there’s an evident assurance that the record-making team know what they’re doing is exactly right. Tasteful tones and masterful grooves feature throughout, in a production that is artfully sparse, so that when an orchestral part swoops into the mix, or fizzy guitar solo bursts in, it has maximum effect. The spirit of ’70s soul still clearly informs his work, but Small Changes is also modernist, with its subtly overdriven beats (fast becoming this decade’s sonic vogue), or the thick, wobbly synth riff that drives Follow Your Dreams.
It’s playful, too. Audience applause and babble opens Lowdown (Part I), in which a rolling Pino Palladino bass part and Al Kooper-styled Hammond interjections from Jimmy Jam conspire to evoke a kind of downtrodden take on The Beta Band’s Dry The Rain, replete with a naggingly beautiful melody. Even if they aren’t often evident in the songs, Kiwanuka says his influences this time around were more wide-ranging: Gene Clark, Sade, Beth Gibbons, Mazzy Star.
Listening to the latter band’s 1993 song Fade Into You apparently inspired the closing track, Four Long Years, which sounds nothing like it but retains its 6/8 time signature and elegant moodiness in a lament for lost love featuring tremolo guitar and a melody that curls like smoke. But as personal as all of these songs sound, there’s a universality to Small Changes that, as with all Kiwanuka’s records, will emotionally connect with others. Everybody hurts, it seems to say, but this might help.
Small Changes is out now on Polydor.
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Tracklisting:
Floating Parade
Small Changes
One And Only
Rebel Soul
Lowdown (part i)
Lowdown (part ii)
Follow Your Dreams
Live For Your Love
Stay By My Side
The Rest Of Me
Four Long Years
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