Jamie Woon emerged at the same time as James Blake, Sampha and Jessie Ware, and provided a human, soulful voice to sit along the mechanical, austere sound of “post-dubstep”. Five years after his debut, Mirrorwriting, Making Time finds Woon creating music that is surprisingly minimal: he has spent that time absorbing the output of Theo Parrish and fellow Brit Floating Points, and you can tell. From the first track, Message, drums and bass dominate, as tracks emerge out of a soulful, primordial murk, with every note and lyric sounding honed, terse and meticulously crafted. He lets go of the leash on Celebration, teaming up with folk noodler Willy Mason, and Thunder, on which his own vocal gymnastics are the focus. Woon might have been expected to return with a dancefloor-focused second album, but instead he’s taken the soul road, and it sounds like a brilliant statement of intent.
