Rockabilly, country and a smidgeon of folk see Sunjay cherry-picking from rock’n’roll and country legends to put his own twist on well recognised songs.

SMOOTH VOCALS AND HARMONIES

From the outset of Split The Sheets, we are made aware of Sunjay’s ability to deliver a top quality performance. He may have dipped a toe in folk music initially earning a young folk artist award but on this album his feet are firmly planted in Nashville. The single, Stephen Bruton’s That’s Love, has all the elements of upbeat country music you need, nothing taken out to diminish it and nothing added to overplay it. It’s solid and tight!!

Sunjay says: “This song captures love exactly as it is,  joyful, chaotic, and impossible to control. We wanted the recording to feel just as alive as the lyric.”

COSINESS

It Must Be Love retains the cosiness of Don William’s original vocals with some smooth harmonies but it romps along to maintain the lively mood already set. Simplicity is the key when appropriate as Hundred Dollar Valentine sees finger picking acoustic blending nicely with some subtle pedal steel.

Some honky piano is added to It’s Late, that still has it’s Buddy Holly style pace and delivery but with Sunjay’s smooth vocals. The same can be said for his version of Love’s Made A Fool of You in which his vocal style is admirably suited to Holly’ s songs.

VARIETY OF COUNTRY STYLES

Sunjay holds different country styles up his sleeve and his swinging jazzy version of Take Out Some Insurance is a real danceable number giving a picture of denim clad cowboys and gingham skirts swirling around. You can tell much thought went into with the many layers of Never Fall In Love Again. Instrumentally it may seem they’ve thrown the kitchen sink at it but they are so well produced harmonica , keyboards, guitar and percussion mesh perfectly.

There’s is thankfully nothing mushy about the more ballady Just Killing The Blues and another song of losing love, Fallin Out which is given a little folky violin element; yet the silky voice shows another side of being in or out of love which this album tackles. Indeed Sunjay himself says: “Split The Sheets looks at love from just about every possible angle. Some songs arrive carrying flowers, others appear with a solicitor.”

FINGER PICKING

Sunjay has been praised before for his finger picking style. In another chilled out Don William’s style delivery it is prevalent again in the yearning If I Needed You.

Bo Diddley’s Who do You Love has been covered in different styles but there’s a strong Buddy Holly riff in this dramatic version before matters are livened up with a rock n roll country Do You Know What I Mean which shuffles along at a pace. Things get distinctly rockier for My Baby Don’t Tolerate before we end with delicious serenity for 45 years.

ALBUM TOUR

Sunjay will showcase the album in the autumn with The Highly Tight Band, which includes Josh Clark on Drums & Bass Guitar, Bob Fridzema on Hammond Organ, Joe Wilkins on Electric Guitar , Astrid Hogendijk and Sarah Warren contributing background vocals. Highly Tight – sounds like it will be exactly that.

Here’s That’s Love:

Sunjay: Website

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