aaamusic | On 30, Jun 2014

After what can only be described as a gigantic couple of years during 2010-12, Christina Perri is now on her second album. The success of monster track ‘Jar Of Hearts’ brought her a slot on the Twilight soundtrack – a VERY big deal. However, since then she hasn’t done anything nearly on the scale of what she’s achieved so far. Head Or Heart was released on April 1 of this year, and ‘Burning Gold’ is track two.

Perri’s relaxed, silky vocals sail over the top of a driving drum beat and a pop-py piano part. The  song starts to gather momentum in the pre-chorus as she sings, “I’ve had enough/Of chasing luck/I need, I need a change”, and it sounds as though there’s going to be a huge explosion of sound in the chorus. There’s definitely the potential for it to have gone that way in the music, but the instruments just don’t push the song as much as they could have. The second verse is relaxed and lovely again, and then we get to the exciting pre-chorus only to be slightly put out again by the chorus itself. The middle 8 is more of the same, but Perri’s vocals really carry the song. It’s a generally nice pop song that could have been really special, but as it is it’s still a good track.

★★★★★

Emma Dodds