Scattered collaborations with the likes of
Disclosure,
Paul White,
Banks, and Portico excepted, nothing was heard from
Jamie Woon for four years following the release of
Mirrorwriting.
Woon was in no rush to complete a second album. Just before his follow-up surfaced in November 2015, he spoke of wanting his return to feel like a rebirth. Despite the freshness of
Making Time, it sure sounds like the work of the same songwriter and producer who recorded the auspicious
Mirrorwriting. It's another batch of nuanced, quietly intense songs that have some degree of heartache to them. The most obvious change, apart from
Woon's advancement as a more imaginative lyricist and an assured and pacifying vocalist, is that
Making Time is less electronic and features a live rhythm section that largely sticks to knotted, lightly funky patterns.
Woon cited
D'Angelo's
Voodoo as an influence, and though he and his co-producers, including Lexx,
White, and
Robin Hannibal, could not be expected to hit that level, the album has a distinctive character that rarely loses its grip. The gently pulsing "Message," the snapping/bobbing "Sharpness," and the subtly gorgeous "Dedication" either match or surpass any given highlight from the debut, as does "Forgiven," an unlikely synthesis of contemporary folk and a late-'90s
Timbaland-like twitch. Given how relaxed and poised the whole sequence plays out,
Woon could have fooled his audience into thinking that he and his partners merely rolled into the studio without any ideas and knocked the whole thing out in a couple weeks. ~ Andy Kellman