Awake ‘O’ Sleeper is the magnificent third album from Tennessee-born Gentry Morris. From the very first track until the final chord of the album is gently strummed, Awake ‘O’ Sleeper grabs hold of you and doesn’t let go. It’s a lush mix of songs, from the beautifully simple title track Awake ‘O’ Sleeper to the sultry Songs For The Lost with its honky-tonk piano and trumpets.

The album has a lot of heart, none of the tracks feel like filler, every one deserves to be there. It’s also clear a lot of time went into the album and making the most of Gentry's stunning voice and fingerstyle acoustic guitar.

Lie, more than any song on the album it shows the raw honestly of Morris’s voice. Would You Really Love Me Then is surprising, it begins fairly ordinarily but builds up to a really sweet and quirky country song, with vocal and whistling harmonies and wonderful lyrics: “You were a mountain and I was a stream, I cut through the rock to the soft soil beneath”.
 

Born in South Georgia in the USA, Morris spent several years touring The States before relocating to Bangor, Northern Ireland in his mid-20s. He has spent the past 2 years sharing the stage with fellow singer-songwriter Juliet Turner who lends vocals to the album.

The most outstanding part of this album is Morris’s sultry voice. His soft southern drawl is more obvious in some songs than others, but what doesn’t change is his ability to use his voice as an instrument to match the tone of each song.

Whether he’s singing blues, jazz or really soft acoustic numbers his voice can be sweet or raw. At times he sounds like James Taylor, other times there’s a hint of Rufus Wainwright. Gentry Morris has one of those voices that you feel you’ve heard a thousand times before, but can’t get enough of.
 

The album is due for release on April 8th and is definitely worth checking out. Morris also has a number of gigs coming up in Dublin and Cork:

• Sat Feb 26: The House, Swords, Dublin.
• Wed Apr 13: The Zodiac Sessions - Bruxelles, Dublin.
• Sun Apr 17: Saucy Sundays - The Grand Social, Dublin
• Wed Apr 20: The Song Room - The Globe, Dublin.
• Wed Apr 27: The Sitting Room De Barras, Clonakilty, West Cork.

Jane Ward