Summer Songs. Karen Jonas

Having reviewed all Karen Jonas' releases on this blog, it may sound strange, but I've never held a physical copy of her work in my hands. So, I have no way of telling for certain whether she released a cover on one of her albums. I take it she released originals exclusively so far. In January of this year she released a Counting Crows cover 'A Long December', in a perfect version at that. And here comes the EP Summer Songs.

It opens with a song that I've known for over half my life, Don Henley's most famous solo song, 'Boys Of Summer'. Not even a big hit in this country, but a song with longevity. Karen Jonas covers it just as sure as she covered 'A Long December'. She makes the song fully her own. With her beautiful voice she draws the song towards her and does not let go, in fact making the song sound a bit tougher at that. Her band sounds spacious, yet so tough. Tim Bray may play the familiar guitar riffs of the song, it is all about what he does in the extra's, like his inventive guitar solo.

The rest of the EP is a very diverse set. 'Summer's Hard For Love' is the most traditional song. With a hint at a genre of pop music that has more to do with my mother's generation. (My dad wasn't one for music at all.) She gives it her soft country flavour, creating the atmosphere she is famous for on this blog and hopefully widely beyond by now.

On 'Thunder On The Battery' Karen Jonas shows a totally different side to her musicianship. The song moves close towards indie rock. Parts of the song estrange, parts endear. Both sides of the song fight for attention, drawing me towards both vantage points over and over again. It makes 'Thunder On The Battery' an intriguing song where one listening session is far from enough for me to fathom it. Although because of the pedal steel guitar contribution their is a country element to this song, apart from the intro there's nothing much remaining of the genre, unless I'm missing out on a major shift in country music.

The fourth and final song is a totally different beast again. A 100% acoustic song, played on an acoustic guitar. However, the mood 'Summer Moon' transgresses into, is not what you would expect from this singer-songwriter setting and not what I expected to hear at the start of the song. 'Summer Moon' is a song with an edge to it. It sounds dirty despite the clean, beautiful guitar parts. Karen Jonas' voice sounds distorted the further the song progresses and far removed from the country singer she is as I can imagine her to get. For the third time she surprises me on a four song EP. If that was her mission, to surprise her fans?, mission accomplished. The more so because of the quality of the songs.

With Summer Songs Karen Jonas in parts shows a different side to her musicianship and has the musicians around her who enable her to do so. Tim Bray never ceases to amaze me with his ability to deliver a great part to all the different songs. Covid-19 permitting Karen Jonas is coming to Europe for the first time. Hopefully to The Netherlands as well.

Wout de Natris

You can listen to and order Summer Songs here:

https://karenjonasmusic.bandcamp.com/album/summer-songs

where you can order her first volume of poems as well!

or listen to our Spotify Playlist to find out what we are writing about:

https://open.spotify.com/user/glazu53/playlist/6R9FgPd2btrMuMaIrYeCh6?si=KI6LzLaAS5K-wsez5oSO2g