Jon Allen is a gravelly voiced troubadour from Winchester who is now based in London. Deep River is his third album of mellow and romantic tunes.
His love light shines so bright that at times it all gets a little too cloying. This is especially evident in the sentiments of Night And Day which could be interpreted either as a profound declaration of love or a case of obsession bordering on emotional blackmail : "If I can't have your love, I don't want to play the game / If I can't have your love, it would be a lie to love again". Taken to its logical conclusion, what he's essentially saying is that rejection could lead to suicide.
All The Money's Gone is preferable as it at least acknowledges love's imperfections: "We belong here together, we're a match made in hell"
I also found the controlled exuberance of Got What's Mine (complete with brass backing) made a nice change from the overall laid back and tasteful mood.
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Aside from this, the main backing music to Allen's voice and guitar come from Rich Milner on Hammond Organ or piano.
The eleven songs exhibit the kind of Radio 2 smoothness whose main fault lies in being almost too perfect with all blemishes carefully airbrushed out.
All the songs are well written and superbly crafted but what I ended up longing for was some of the rawness you find in the great blues records.
Jon Allen's website
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