HANNAH RODRIGUEZ – EP REVIEW

Hannah Rodriguez - Not Ideal EP
Hannah Rodriguez - Not Ideal EP

Release Date: Out Now

I honestly don’t know what I expected from the debut four track EP produced by recent London immigrant Hannah Rodriguez but it certainly wasn’t this. To be clear, when I say immigrant, Rodriguez has come from the Lake District before any Daily Mail readers burst a blood vessel (also, if you are a Daily Mail reader, please jog on). The EP opens with a four count and then straight in to ‘My Mate Says’ that sounds like Amy Winehouse singing with Morcheeba while Sneaker Pimps get experimental on production duties. The soft, warm keys and Rodriguez’s dusky tones are counterbalanced by moody, soulful horns and that clicking beat that is as lean as can be. On ‘11th Hour’, we’re transported to the back of a black cab on its way home with Rodriguez sleepily singing her way to the end of the day which puts you in a dream-like state with a vibe that sits on the fence between soul and trip-hop.


There’s some scratchy recording of a child talking at the start of ‘Not Ideal’ before we settle in to a slow, deep groove that the likes of Joss Stone and Corrine Bailey-Rae would happily get down and dirty in. Rodriquez’s voice has that wonderful quality of being both sultry and seductive to suit those late-night moods but also light, breezy and warm to suit a summer’s afternoon spent in the garden with old records drifting out from the house. The closing track on the EP is ‘Croissants & Coffee’ which takes things in a Jazz direction as that delicately placed guitar is enveloped by Rodriguez’s sumptuous voice like butter melting in to the holes on a warm crumpet. A gorgeous and versatile voice used expertly, then. The Lake District might just want this lady back.



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