Jens Lekman – Evening Prayer

Last Sunday after publishing Going For A Song I realised the last three had been mainly about the dead. So for this week I’ve chosen a song that has survival, friendship and living at its centre.

‘Evening Prayer’ is taken off an album, Life Will See You Now, I’ll tentatively say I’m falling for. I’d usually hesitate to apply the language of relationships to the experience of listening to an album, but for this one it feels very apt. There’s a rush of feeling conveyed by the music’s bold, bright sound; and when that begins to subside it’s an album that knows what to do to keep you interested (a lesser album would draw out the very pop thrill of the spelled “I love you” at the end of ‘Our First Fight”, but this brilliantly, effectively, doesn’t).

This is all held in check by Jen’s Lekman’s voice. A voice that, even when singing of love and extolling the virtues of friendships and relationships, reminds the listener, just by its very tenor, of their perils and fragility.