His musical virtuosity might have elicited gushing praise from Eric Clapton, but LA singer-songwriter and sought-after session musician Blake Mills (his CV includes work with Beck, Lucinda Williams and Jackson Browne) delivers a surprisingly low-key second album. The country and blues-influenced guitar work that had Clapton salivating is more often than not muted and economical, with little in the way of showboating. The songs themselves, meanwhile, are slow, hushed affairs, evoking memories of Elliott Smith (particularly on Half Asleep) and only sparking into life sporadically, most notably on the unexpectedly unfettered Before It Fell. Heigh Ho is elegantly conceived, but there’s little to quicken the pulse here.
