#TEAMw21 were introduced to Rachel Croft last night and she made quite the impression - an enormous stage presence in all ways with a great wit and charm and a batch of immediately likable songs - ones you felt you had known you whole life and none more so than "Reap What You Sow". This track is coming from her "Live At the Crooked Room Studio" album and for the forseeable future, it will be the only song available to stream - so if you want more ( and who wouldn't?) in this format then you'll need to purchase the cd from Rachel.
Introduced last night as being about "someone who annoyed me" - this live version is a pretty good facsimile of what we heard then, an electric guitar being played slowly, deliberately, precisely picking out each note.
The vocals when delivered could not be more withering - the opening lines
"You're a bitter little man - this I know!
Pour salt upon the land - you're gonna reap what you sow"
Rachel has a marvellous calm soulful voice, each set of lines is delivered with a calm dispassionate distaste
"Mask of a friend - green eyed foe
Now you bit the hand - you're going to reap what you sow"
There are just flashes where she unleashes a bluesy jazz style delivery at volume to great effect - impressively rippling through the scales.
"You leave a nasty taste on my tongue
Hey must be from that poison you grow"
For the latter part of the song, the spoken words seem to barely tumble from Rachel's mouth, coming out as a breathy whisper - she leaves us with a few final notes on the guitar on what is a stunning bravura performance.
Rachel also illustrated the artwork herself - the flower is birdsfoot trefoil. She always had a vision of birdsfoot trefoil being associated with this song, as it's a Victorian symbol for revenge - and tat revenge has most certainly been served.
Reap What You Sow Live is available on all platforms
Live At The Crooked Room is available at https://rachelcroftmusic.com/shop/live-at-crooked-rooms