Relish contains songs performed in a mixture of styles: contemporary folk, rock, and pop. This 12 track album opens with second single "St. Teresa." opened with some wonderful mandolin, that's setted against Joan's vocals. Her voice hints at a pending rock vocal, but this song remains light as the guitars and mandolin sit alongside her voice. The light shuffling beat and bass keep out of their way allowing those instruments and Joan to shine. Next is "Man In The Long Black Coat", a 1989 song written by legendary growler, Bob Dylan. Joan’s voice pretty well suits covering a croaky Dylan song. It's a nice miserable song. Third single Right Hand Man follows this, and this gives us a burst of energy and it stays throughout. The tempo is up, and the electric guitar and bass suggest a nice roaring rock song. Instead, Joan's opening lyrics sound like your mum checking that you've packed for your holiday. Here again, she vocally sounds like Allison Moorer, but also of contemporary chart-botherer, Sheryl Crow.
Next was "Pensacola" . The tempo was down, and in this track, Joan was underscored with subdued chugging guitars, a harmonica and bass, and they sat perfectly to allowed her vocals to dominate the track perfectly. The vocals are narrative, giving the song a journey to follow, and it builds slowly, adding more backing vocals and guitar as it builds. "Dracula Moon," began almost sinisterly with chugging guitar alongside bass. Joan's vocals are also on par singing about bones and disease. The harmonica weaves throughout as the song winds along, eventually duelling with the guitars. Joan's vocal power and range were in full exhibition mode here,
Next was the very familiar guitar sequence of lead single "One Of Us". It then fully bursts open and gaves us that rich, familiar, old friend that we remember, it was a fairly mid-tempo song, the wave of sound set alongside Joan’s vocals, imagining a God doing everyday things like riding a bus. Piano and guitar chase each other around in the intro of "Ladder", that was the album's fourth and final single, as Joan warmed up the vocals that led into the verse. Once into the flow of the song, the melody founds itself alongside Joan's voice, and the repeating ‘heyheyhey yeah’ backing chanting vocals help to keep it brewing. "Spider Web" came next, we're back to Moorer territory, perhaps aided by the collection of fiddles that gave it a more country sound.
Growling guitars opened "Let's Just Get Naked," Joan's vocals here sound a bit too bored and aloof that they can't be bothered to cooperate with the melody in this song. The result was a song that I don’t care about either, and it deteriorates after about the 4 minute mark. "Help Me," a cover of the blues artist Sonny Boy Williamson. Vocally, this was just sounds like a jam session was recorded with some musicians who know each other well. Penultimate track "Crazy Baby" followed this. Joan showed off more tuneful vocals here adding warmth by the bucketload, as the musicians underline her with a wonderfully slick sounding song. The album closed with "Lumina", a mellow song setting softer vocals from Joan alongside a guitar and synth. The track did make it into an episode of The Sopranos.
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