Jorja Smith – ‘What Are The Odds’ review: embracing catharsis on the dancefloor

Jorja Smith has never been afraid to be noisy. Among sombre and sobering offerings lie the exhilarating, elastic segments of the 29-year-old Walsall native’s discography; the pulse of the two-step-infused ‘On My Mind’, the clubby ‘Little Things’ or the alt-leaning ‘Go Go Go’. Smith is as much R&B as she is house, an equilibrium of sorts – once she acquaints herself with a genre, she’s able to contort it to her will, translating it to her audience in a hue that makes sense to her. READ MORE: Meet KatzPascale, the chamber music duo putting audiences in a trance On ‘What Are The Odds’, however, the singer-songwriter clearly wants to dance. What happens when Smith embraces the noise? Perched alongside executive producer P2J, the pair worked across three immersive sessions to create an arresting, club-ready collaborative effort. There’s a familiar tension amid the escapist synths though: the confrontation of emotions. The all-encompassing embrace of the challenging, difficult, soothing and harsh realities of a person that’s lived, loved and wore her heart on her sleeve along the way. Smith has always been one to confront her realities in the booth, and ‘What Are The Odds’ is no diff...