Ananya Jafa (who makes music as just ‘Jafa’) released her debut single ‘Two Thousand And Eighteen’ last year, and it was clear to any listener about 30 seconds into the first listen that she was going to be a talent to watch out for. Even though it’s getting more and more common in the present day for a musician to come out the gate with a quality recording that’s well-produced (accessibility to creative tools is easier than it has ever been), there are cases in which an artist ends up leaning on this without having the writing to back it up. On the wonderful ‘Words Leave’, Jafa shows that she already has a close to fully-formed musical identity. And that, well… that’s rare.

Simplicity is key in this now time-honoured tradition, and Jafa does it to a T. Her vocal melody is wistful, the production is warm, and there are a few textures (ambient voices, electronic panned effects. glitchy drums) that are used sparingly to great effect. But at the end of the day, it’s the writing of the tune that really shines through. The word ‘evocative’ is one of the most overused while talking about music qualitatively; all it means is that a piece of music has the potential to make the listener feel something. That being said, ‘Words Leave’ is one of the best examples of this concept. It does that intangible thing that songs sometimes do - in the right mood and frame of mind, it can take you to a place, and once it ends, you subconsciously want to listen to it again and again to stay there.

If that was too flowery an explanation, it would be recommended to just go and listen to what is essentially a really good piano-backed pop song. That’s it.