The Corinne Bailey Rae Albums Ranked
As my mother will tell you, when I heard Corinne Bailey Rae as a child, I remarked that “she sounds like she’s smiling when she’s singing.” Now that I’ve visited her full discography, which isn’t exactly prolific with four albums released over the over 17 years since 2006, that quality may apply more specifically to an earlier part of Rae’s career. But in recent years, a conscious effort to re-contextualize her place in a kind of “twee” singer-songwriter mold of the mid-2000s has shifted what I expect from her and demonstrated an ability to musically evolve. Omitted from this list is THE LOVE EP (2011), a good little collection of covers.
#4 — THE HEART SPEAKS IN WHISPERS (2016)
Favorite track: “Tell Me”
After taking an over six year break from album releases (still not the widest gap in her career), Rae came back with THE HEART SPEAKS IN WHISPERS, a definite change from the one-two punch of the style demonstrated on her first two records. There is a whimsical lightness on this album, to be sure, but it’s darkened by crunchy electronic sounds and song structures that don’t wholly conform to fun pop confection nor angsty ballad. Although the experimentation on the record is impressive in a way, the risk of such experimentation is that the music can be not purely enjoyable. I’d hesitate to say that THE HEART SPEAKS IN WHISPERS is a fully challenging listen (it’s not exactly avant-garde), but there’s no denying that Rae’s reckoning with her musical identity led to some gaps in listenability.
#3 — BLACK RAINBOWS (2023)
Favorite track: “New York Transit Queen”
Rae took even longer to make BLACK RAINBOWS than THE HEART SPEAKS IN WHISPERS (it’s been over seven years since the latter) and took that time to make an even bigger leap from the style that launched her career. Single “New York Transit Queen,” which is also my favorite track on the album, led me to believe BLACK RAINBOWS would be a punk record informed by the riot grrrl bands of the ’90s. Although there are a few companion tracks that solidify that vibe here and there, in the main, the album is a spacey yet dark exploration of, if not ambient, then less formally rigid song structures. The more aggressive work is BLACK RAINBOWS’ main appeal to me, because although I found the other experiments from Rae on the album somewhat compelling, they don’t hold my attention as well.
#2 — THE SEA (2010)
Favorite track: “Paris Nights/New York Mornings”
The fact that THE SEA, Rae’s sophomore album, could be seen as a departure from her debut seems a little silly now considering the two records that followed it. It’s true that much of THE SEA is informed by the sudden and tragic death of Rae’s husband, but in handling that grief, she made beautifully aching songs that still sparkle with the light appeal of her earliest work. And indeed, some of the record is filled out with upbeat songs written before and after the life-changing loss; “Paris Nights/New York Mornings” is one such example and my favorite track. Because the truth of the matter is that Rae’s “simpler” days, if only because they more pleasingly channel soul and R&B inspirations into contemporary pop rock, are still the most moving to me. THE SEA is a great expansion of the musician’s initial success, deepening the emotional complexity while sacrificing only a modicum of earworm-iness.
#1 — CORINNE BAILEY RAE (2006)
Favorite track: “Put Your Records On”
I must admit that nostalgia is a hell of a drug. I cannot really believe it’s been 17 years since its release, but CORINNE BAILEY RAE was played in its entirety quite often in my household growing up. Revisiting it in full for the first time in a long time, I was somewhat taken aback by just how much I loved almost every track on the album. Rae’s debut almost reaches my unofficial “all killer no filler” designation in the vein of the poppy “neo soul” of the mid-2000s. While there is undeniably an admirable aspect to her more recent experiments and left turns, I am quite often a basic boy, and by the way, when did pop music get less fun? “Put Your Records On,” and indeed the whole of Rae’s debut album, still stands as her greatest commercial success. The sellable streamlining of ’70s influences and the guitar-pop of singer-songwriters from the late ’90s and early 2000s was seen as a cunning but lackluster veneer by some critics at the time of this release, but making consistently fun music is more challenging than it looks. That’s why CORINNE BAILEY RAE is the artist’s best album.
