Joy Crookes Skin LP

Skin is the 2022 debut album and hugely personal body of work from one of the UK's boldest and brightest young talents, Joy Crookes. A collection of songs built and honed throughout her adolescence and into her early twenties, it weaves through topics such as mental health, relationships, and politics all with grace and sensitivity. Recorded between Abbey Road and Konk and produced by Blue May (Kano, Blood Orang), the end product is a debut record that is both perfectly of the moment, and entirely timeless.

Transcending labels with her blend of neo-soul and R&B, she takes all the hooks, choruses, and high value associated with pop and packages them into something wiser. After all, calls to soul, jazz, and Motown are considered the province of generations past, right? Wrong. Spiced up with modern production and relatable reference points, 22-year-old Crookes is the real thing.

Close and justified comparisons will obviously be drawn to Amy Winehouse, but it's not just a similarity in old school warmth that Joy draws with her fellow Londoner; like Amy, there's a timeless quality to Skin that pulls equally from more nostalgic orchestral flourishes ('When You Were Mine') and slicker, more modern influences like the Massive Attack-echoing '19th Floor'. It does everything a debut should, dipping into multiple pools but uniting them all with a consistent outlook and a clear voice. Joy Crookes, by rights, should be riding Skin into the big leagues.

Blessed with the kind of earthy, jazzy vocals that immediately ground her songs with brevity and presence, the South Londoner communicates a community's worth of life lessons in thirteen songs. Stapled together with catchy piano riffs, brassy interjections and soaring string sections, Skin proves Crookes a competent producer, singer, songwriter, and overall artist.

If the point of a debut album is getting to know an artist, then Skin is a masterclass.