Annie Keating - Trick Star (2016)

This is the seventh album by Brooklyn-based Americana singer-songwriter Annie Keating. Once again it is a strong and consistent collection, nestling happily into that soft focus urban angst that comes of living, loving and losing. Mary Chapin Carpenter has travelled the same road, albeit with a shade more intensity and impact.

Keating may not be up to that measure right now but she and her deft band are still very good at colouring these occasionally excellent songs. They vary between the good times (You Bring the Sun, Lucky), the bad times (Slow Waltz, Come and Go) and the bits in between (the muscular title track and the playful Creatures).

Keating’s voice is not especially distinctive but her performances radiate warmth and honesty not least on the feel-good Phoenix, the final track on which she is joined by the Brooklyn Youth Chorus.