Latest review: Dido - Safe Trip Home

Dido
Safe Trip Home
Genre: Pop
Highlight: Grafton Street

HERE'S a singer-songwriter who could easily have put up her white flag and surrendered by now. Having already worked with Faithless and Eminem as a guest vocalist, seen two previous albums enjoy huge success and even inspired her own hairstyle among female followers, it's fair to say Dido could quite rightly have rested on previous laurels.

So Safe Trip Home, the third and latest release from the 36-year-old Londoner, has an awful lot to live up to. It'll doubtless be a big seller simply on the back of her previous plaudits, but the eleven tracks that have evolved from a hiatus of almost five years are bound to get a mixed reception from all but the most casual of listeners.

The best news is that Dido's incredible, slightly jagged falsetto remains as strong as it did when No Angel, her debut album, first impressed critics eight long years ago. Few voices in pop today are as distinctive and yet so soothing, and deservedly it still gets top billing on an album that's otherwise a departure from the Dido signature style.

Songs like the melancholic Grafton Street show a brave bid to get away from the trip-hop sound of both No Angel and feisty follow-up Life for Rent, showing a more Celtic side to the singer's repertoire. Look No Further also proves itself as a powerful, piano-led ballad which wouldn't seem out of place in a weepy rom-com, but these promising highlights aside the Safe Trip Home slowly goes a little too safe for most ears.

It's easy to see where Dido is coming from with this album but it sadly lacks the sparkle of its predecessors. There's nothing especially wrong with it, but nothing really memorable either.

Put it this way: I doubt Slim Shady would want to sample any of the tracks.

CD provided by Tesco, Llandudno Junction