Danish jazz vocalist, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Mads Mathias writes on his website that he decided early on not to compromise, use shortcuts or let time or money shape the quality or quantity of his artistic output, “but only to stop when I arrived at the sound I had in my head”.

Which might explain the nine-year hiatus between his first solo album Free Falling, several songs from which featured in his terrific Scottish debut which I had the pleasure of reviewing at the 2016 Edinburgh Jazz & Blues Festival, and his highly anticipated sophomore album I’m All Ears which is due for release on 12 November on Europe’s oldest independent jazz label Storyville Records.

If Free Falling was swing-a-ling-ding, then I’m All Ears is sway-a-way-way: an infectiously upbeat and effortlessly charming take on matters-of-the-heart comprising nine original tracks whose sweet and subtle synthesis of carefully crafted lyrics, memorably toe-tapping tunes and beautifully balanced arrangements evoke the swooning sentiments of the title track: “I want to hear every single word you say / For whenever you speak I melt away”.

From the opening Forget Me Not which draws a bucketful of hope out of the break-up well of despair – “long nights alone” and “shadows on the wall” prompt the plucky refrain “there’ll be something new under the sun” – to the closing Little Then Did I Know whose haunting memories of a former lover are over time “easy to forgive” if “harder to forget” – Mathias and his exceptionally talented ensemble who include one of the UK’s leading jazz arrangers Guy Barker are the light at the end of a very long Covid tunnel. As epitomised in the poignant postscript to Labour Of Love: “April showers bring out May flowers”.

Though humour whips his weary wit as well. None more so than the put-upon protagonist of Henpecked Man (which according to my notes of his Edinburgh concert was born out of a series of short-lived romantic encounters in his youth) whose mounting to-do list of “do this, do that, change your hair / feed the dog, then the cat; build, fix and repair” draws a wry smile. As does the two-left-footed tangoist of If I Were A Dancer who refuses to let his soft-shoe shuffling shortcomings hamper his wooing, which is given glorious voice by the carefree harmonica playing of Mathias Heise.

Mads Mathias may be all ears, but it is the apple of his eye who is cherished in Marigold, a tender meditation on the passage of time and of a parent letting go. The mellow fruitfulness of which, like so many jewels in this fine, feel-good sophomore album, confirms that after nine years he has definitely “arrived at the sound I had in my head.”

Peter Callaghan
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