Joss Stone slammed

Let’s be honest. I can’t stand Joss Stone’s music. Or any of her supermarket popster contemporaries – Norah Jones, Katie Melua, Jamie Cullum. Or those earnest young men who drone on from the same hymn sheet.

Why? Because what they offer has been done before, many times over. And it has been done far, far better.

So I was intrigued to see Joss Stone’s new album/gigs slammed in the press. “Big voice, little to say” was the message. Which had been exactly my own reaction when she was being praised to the skies at launch a few years ago.

But to single out Stone for such criticism is very unfair. Hell, all the big soul singers are guilty of the same sin – over-excitable, inappropriate vocals, limited content, poorly expressed. Haven’t the critics currently slamming Stone ever listened carefully to Aretha Franklin or Tina Turner?



Gerry Smith