When Celeste landed at the top of the BBC Sound of 2020 poll in 2020, the headline was set: a new soul hope with a voice to die for, somewhere halfway between Amy Winehouse and Adele. Accordingly, the album debut NOT YOUR MUSE 2021 immediately shot to the top of the British album charts. Four years and a breakup later, what the record company calls a “recalibration” follows.
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And indeed the conditions have changed. While a whole group of producers and songwriters were involved in the debut, one was enough for WOMAN OF FACES: Jeff Bhasker, previously live musical director for Kanye West and Lady Gaga and one of the producers behind Harry Styles and Bruno Mars, was the right choice. He condenses Celeste’s soul sound, which sometimes seemed indifferent on the debut, into a highly dramatic amalgamation that perfectly conveys sadness.
In fact, the conditions have changed
This means that new names appear in the reference space. The tearful arrangements of the title track or “Keep Smiling” have the soul of Gladys Knight, while elsewhere the songs have the orchestral pressure of a James Bond soundtrack from the 1970s. Restraint is rarely the measure of things on this album.
You have to be able to endure it in all its gravitas, but that has always been a recommended character trait of Soul. If you do it, you will be rewarded a few times on this album: In “Carmens’ Song” we suddenly hear a flute that pumps an otherworldly Tarantino groove into the song and somehow also a little hope, because even the blackest sorrow eventually passes.
This review first appeared in Musikexpress 12/2025.