Marina and The Diamonds might sound like a band but in fact that collective name is merely the front for one woman – the half-Greek/half-Welsh Marina Diamandis. She first popped up last year among the gaggle of female tips for the top that included Florence & The Machine and La Roux but do The Family Jewels sparkle or are they junk gems? Read our Marina and The Diamonds – The Family Jewels review to find out.
Marina and The Diamonds is often hailed as this generation’s Kate Bush, a swooping, screeching, eccentric singer/songwriter with a wilfully skewed worldview. The comparison is mostly pretty lazy but is bang on when it comes to Diamandis’s ability to pen a pop hit. The clattering Mowgli’s Road and Tory Amos-esque Obsessions are delightful in their detail and joyful inventiveness.
The gypsy musicbox jaunt of the title track, The Family Jewels, is similarly odd while the piano strut of I Am Not A Robot is surely set for rerelease as a single. But current Top 20 mainstay, Hollywood, fails to live up to its promise as a satire on LA’s chew-’em-up-and-spit-’em-out approach to female stars. It’s clear what Marina and the Diamonds had in mind but the smooth pop sheen drowns out what makes her interesting.
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The Family Jewels is littered with Marina’s many personalities. She rarely settles for one singing style in a song, swooping around the octaves and dropping in almost as many vocal tics as Michael Jackson in his “cha mon!” shouting heyday. The strength of her songwriting keeps the kookiness on the right side of irritating but you do sometimes wish Marina and The Diamonds played it straight a little more.
While Little Boots disappointed with her debut, ditching much of what made her intriguing in the first place in a quest to become the Lidl Kylie, Marina and The Diamonds’ first effort feels like its powered entirely by her 100W personality, even if that can be a little tiring at times. ??The Family Jewels doesn’t feel cohesive as an album but the full-throated synth-pop of Shampain and piano pieces like Hermit The Frog and Obsessions are still clearly products of the same fevered imagination. Marina and The Diamonds is definitely worth your time, just don’t expect The Family Jewels to be easy to get your head around. The gems are there but finding them takes a bit of digging.
