Soft, arpeggiated piano, big, gated snare, and emotional, reverb-soaked vocals are the order of the day here for Perth-native Alexis Naylor’s ‘Stealing Moments’, a story of love and loss and the easy, open-ended social media world of single-click engagements. It’s a compelling track, made more potent still by the excellent narrative video which accompanies it. Naylor’s voice is powerful, alternating between soft and sorrowful and angry and accusative, the lyrics telling a tale of trust, tears, and uncomfortable truths.
Taken from her debut album ‘Pages From A Past Life’, and fully in the best traditions of solo female singer-songwriters, there’s elements of Delta Goodrum and Dido in Naylor’s vocal, the track melancholy without ever over-stepping into maudlin, emotive without ever becoming over-earnest. There’s elements of ‘rock ballad’ sneaking in there from the production, but it’s by no means worse-off for that, the big drum sound adding to the punch of the track and contrasting nicely with the softer piano and Naylor’s downcast vocal performance, adding to the evincing of heartbreak and pain from a relationship that just can’t, quite, let go.
You can check out the superb video for ‘Stealing Moments’, including the excellent choreography of Peta Coy and the narrative moves of dancers Lockie Ransom and Madeline Dona, on YouTube; follow Alexis Naylor on Facebook and Instagram.
Review by Alex Holmes