Horses and High Heels Dramatico Records**

Marianne Faithfull is one of the last of her kind standing – rock music royalty, if you will, with almost 50 years of public life to her name. Yet she remains a singular fringe artist, steadfastly clinging to the peripheral. Horses and High Heelsis no different, but there's little here that Faithfull hasn't done better or more astutely. There's no denying, of course, that her voice is a thing of lived-in beauty, its intonation just the right side of ravaged and the wrong side of perfect. With covers of songs from the likes of Carole King ( Goin' Back), The Shangri-Las ( Past Present and Future) and The Gutter Twins ( The Stations), there's no complaining about the breadth of influence and talent on display, just a nagging doubt about the weapons in Faithfull's arsenal getting rusty. See mariannefaithfull.org.uk

Download tracks: Love Song, Goin' Back