Allergic to water

"Ani is now in her 40s and it's perhaps unreasonable to expect the searing level of lyrical sharpness that characterised her earlier work (...); yet it's still disappointing to hear her dabbling with hazy melodies and rhythms and, in a smoky jazz setting, singing of personal contentment in Happy All The Time rather than wider issues. Admittedly it's a well-constructed song (in which Buddha, Christ and Miles Davis make an appearance) ... This said, there's plenty in the brooding title track (where, for once, the piano/acoustric guitar/drum arrangement adds drama and intrigue) to show she can still hit the mark when writing about the human spirit; and the well-executed rolling blues Hard Than It Needs To Be proves it's not all happy families and she's still far from a lost cause ".