A tribute to female artists past and present who have inspired her own musical journey, Sarah Jane Morris with her co-writer and co-producer guitarist Tony Rémy has come up with one of her most compelling albums in an enduringly successful career that spans genres and outlasts cloyingly ephemeral fads. The Communards icon has chosen Aretha Franklin, Bessie Smith, Annie Lennox, Miriam Makeba and Janis Joplin among the inspiring female icons to write new songs dedicated to. Rémy known for his long Blues Experience residency at Ronnie Scott's is a blues drenched Boswell to her Dr Johnson given the voluminous dictionary of conversational riffs and grooves the lyrics are surrounded with. Nina Simone is whisperingly celebrated on 'So Much Love' and songs for Rickie Lee Jones, Kate Bush - a French dressing on the magnetic 'Rimbaud of Suburbia' track liberally applied - Billie Holiday and Joni Mitchell also make the cut. ''The Sisterhood is a complex, ambitious project which demands a full band,'' Morris told the PRS For Music in-house magazine M recently. And certainly The Sisterhood proves just so and is about original deeply marinated writing at work validated for posterity. And what vastly powerful blues drenched vocals pacily and soulfully delivered are imaginatively displayed. The Rickie Lee Jones tribute 'Jazz Side of the Road' and Nina paean 'So Much Love' are super delightful and leap out most. But the ratio of killer to filler is very high in favour of the former and so impossibly cool more than enough to appeal to both skylarks and night owls alike. Sarah Jane Morris, photo: cover art detail
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