I know next to nothing about Lauren Hoffman, and the cover art doesn’t give to many clues beyond the fact that she’s a female with a guitar. I suspect this could all change fairly soon, though. Having wrested her way free of the clutches of a contract with Virgin, which saw her first two albums criminally underpromoted, she’s been working with indie labels since the turn of the millennium, and building her audience at a more grass roots level.
Slicker and less overtly dark than her previous works, ‘Family Ghost’ is one of those albums that’s got immense appeal, not because it’s mainstream slop, but because it has the kind of commercial accessibility to slip into the mainstream coupled with enough edge to give it alternative cred. Hers is a sound rooted in classic rock, but with a subtly-infused alternative edge, and which also draws on country and folk without being The Corrs or Mumford and Sons.
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And she knows how to write an engaging song. There are 11 of them on ‘Family Ghost’. From the understated opener, ‘Don’t Look Back’, with its melancholy hues and which are blown a way in a wall-of-sound blast, to the reflective ‘Til it Lasts’, ‘Family Ghosts’ is as diverse as it is solid.
‘Feel it All’ is a clear standout, a piano-augmented anthem that would sit comfortably on the radio and has obvious Academy-size venue-filling potential, and it’s a fair indication of Hoffman’s potential, given a fair wind.
Lauren Hoffman & The Secret Storm Online
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