Lucy Rose: Like I Used To – review

Lucy Rose Parton seems to have been teleported from the 1960s, where her fragile songs and home-made jam (she sells it at gigs) would have made her a worthy supporting player in the pastoral-folk scene. "Supporting" being the operative word: the Warwickshire-bred vocalist and her acoustic guitar (plus unobtrusive band) create a hazy sound that leaves you feeling as if you've bathed in lavender oil – lovely, but lacking the acerbic touch that would elevate her to a leading role. In its unassertive way, though, her debut album is a trove of small pleasures. Lines is a sunny uplands of a song, startlingly intersected by a volley of cannon-fire bass; Night Bus is a deceptively sweet thing that sympathetically depicts a coven of depressed night people. The beautiful, blurred ballad Place takes Rose into Feist territory, before erupting into an Ed Sheeranish mid-tempo canter. Best known, until now, as a backing vocalist for Bombay Bicycle Club, Rose is worth hearing in her own right, as much for her emollient effect as anything else.