Back in the UK after her ‘Love Me Or Hate Me’ raid on the U.S. with Jay Z and that whole Def Jam thing that got her headlining in Times Square on New Years Eve a couple of years ago. It all seemed just too good to be true after her break-through hit ‘Random’ on Ross Allen’s label Casual (they of Foresight: Urban (blimey, that was 5 years ago!) So after all the trappings of celebrity (I seem to recall she looked a bit fish out of water on Soccer A.M. when ‘Hoodie’ came out) has the Queen of Neasden grown up?

I was a big fan of The Cure in the early days but ‘Close To Me’ was about the last thing they did of any significance (discuss). But what’s that got to do with Louise Harman? Well, she’s just upset the Cure’s fans by sampling their “divine” tune for her new single, ‘So Human’ - Mr. Smith doesn’t care thought as he’s on 50% so that’s OK. But, there she goes again; she does things her own way sticking the proverbial two fingers to her haters.

It’s probably the catchy one on the album but Jigsaw is not just midget mouth’s vision as for the other 9 tracks, she’s teamed up again with her original producer, Medasyn (also known as Gabriel Olegavich and Gabriel Prokofiev, head honcho of Nonclassical, they of John Matthias and Nick Ryan’s Cortical Songs); and yes, he is related as per his interview on Today this week.

Bringing the fun back to the beats, ‘Let’s Be Mates’ is a happy uptempo bounce with trademark “cheeky” lyrics and delivery and ‘I Got You Dancing!’ is as dancefloor friendly as electro grimers get.

The tracks that don’t work well, as usual with hip-hop is the self-pitying ‘I’m so hard done by’ raps that whine about her lot in the music biz (she should worry). In particular ‘Pennies’ is nauseating in recessionary times (a point she makes herself). And then they totally flip it with ‘Guitar’. How’d that happen? We’ll she takes the p out of herself and Prokoviev has added live strings here (and on the title track, ‘Jigsaw’ which even sees Ms. Sov singing for the first time).

Perhaps the lyrics on Daniel Haaksman Presents Funk Mundial might be a bit more “real’ or inspired than Lady Sov having a pop at students (on ‘Student Union’). But then Jigsaw is her own hip-hop-synth-pop-electro sound, and when she gets it right, she’s irresistible (have a laugh with her with ‘Food Play’ and the ghetto, ‘I Got The Goods’).

On ‘I Got The Goods’ she proclaims to be the ‘biggest midget in the game’ and like the lyrics to Jigsaw, she’s a bit of a puzzle but there’s more to this than just getting her pony tail cut off; support the ‘Bang Bang’ sound of Lady Sovereign and live dates in May all over the U.S. and Europe in the summer.

Love me or hate me? There’s much to love on Jigsaw and we’ll leave the hating to haters. Luv U Sov <3

UK TOUR
6th June - Concorde 2, Brighton
8th June - King Tutts, Glasgow
9th June - Academy 2, Birmingham
10th June - Kings College, London
11th June - Waterfront, Norwich
12th June - Academy 3, Manchester

FESTIVALS
5th July - Wireless Festival, Hyde Park, London
11th July - Splash Festival, Halbinsel Pouch, Leipzig, Germany
10th August - Pantiero Festival, Cannes
20th August - Hip Hop Kemp Festival, Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic

Reviewed: Lady Sovereign - Jigsaw (Midget Records/EMI) Cat. No: MID02CD Release date: 13th April 2009
Tracklisting:
1 Let’s Be Mates (3:20)
2 So Human (3:57)
3 Jigsaw (3:32)
4 Bang Bang (3:22)
5 I Got You Dancing… (3:34)
6 Pennies (3:05)
7 Guitar (3:33)
8 Student Union (3:06)
9 Food Play (5:13)
10 I Got The Goods (3:02)

Links:
LadySovereign.com
myspace.com/LadySovereign
www.myspace.com/medasn
Radio 4: Today @ 0823 “Avant-garde classical composers are less recognisable that their fine art contemporaries. Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin have become household names whereas David Stubbs has not. He discusses why people get Rothko but don’t get Stockhausen with composer and producer Gabriel Prokofiev.” Weds 29th April 2009 http://news.bbc.co.uk/today
www.casuallondon.com