Peace And Offerings

Presented as an EP or “project”, so missed out on best of 2021 album lists, but at eight tracks and packed with serious musical substance, Peace and Offerings absolutely deserves to be appreciated as an album. It’s the sound of grown up Katy, but also a reversion to her youth: it’s her stepping aside from the dancefloor and diving into the R&B and neo soul she grew up on. But it’s not just a straightforward tribute to Jill Scott and SWV by any means. For starters it hit a very current 2020s seam of London soul-jazz and Afrobeat smoothness and sounds as modern as it does retro. And second, Katy’s voice and songwriting remain super distinctive: her narratives of relationship intrigue are as convincing as her club life storytelling on early work, and her hooks are as irresistible as ever.