That voice. A woman? A man? Clearly, that can’t be said when she finally appears after several bars at the song “Home” as if from far away.
Joshua Hyslop, who owns this warm and unisexual voice, is a singer/songwriter from the Canadian prairie state of Saskatchewan. Whoever hears the songs of “Echos”, his third album released in 2018, knows about the 31-year-old: he is a hopeless romantic. A (day) dreamer and poet. A musician who doesn’t shy away from feel-good harmonies that reach the limits of kitsch. Even at the risk of being labeled a Softi by critics. Just as he sings about his fears and hopes with devotion and sometimes relentless honesty, such flatteries of review should be of no concern to him anyway. One hears, one feels: here one does his thing. Like many singer/songwriters, Joshua Hyslop’s writing and singing about love, friendship and God and the world won’t miss its therapeutic effect. That’s why listeners occasionally feel like someone who involuntarily witnesses a talk therapy – for example on the track “This Is How It Goes”: wisdom about ways, wrong ways and crossroads of a love relationship wrapped in incredibly beautiful harmonies. If you don’t melt away in the chorus, you have to have a heart of stone. Joshua Hyslop succeeds in touching the listener. The fact that the production occasionally turns out somewhat smooth is something one gladly accepts. Oh yes: Despite all qualities Joshua Hyslop is still a very secret secret tip – and thus a real pearl.
