While Charlie Wood's previous release on the Memphis-based independent label Archer Records, his fine 2012 album Lush Life, served up an 11-track collection of covers, New Souvenirs sees the singer, songwriter and keyboardist return to the fertile territory of self-penned material. Co-produced with his wife, Jacqui Dankworth, it's a collection of 12 memorable songs of a quite startling diversity, united by their pointed emotional power. The album's lead-off song, ‘No Repose’, is a slow-burner that builds to an impassioned, string-laden climax. ‘Music Is My Monkey’ is a funky personal credo driven irresistibly onwards by Wood on clav and organ. The flowing, iridescent textures of ‘Until the Fall’ finds Wood at his most poetic, while the state-of-the-human-race ‘Mercy’ is all the more compelling for its understatement. ‘Tube’ is a witty, rimshot and bass-driven critique of Wood's adoptive hometown's underground system (“It's tough to be a rat down there”.) By contrast, ‘The Tide’ is all gorgeous, close harmony backing harmonies. The album closes as it opens, with one of Wood's beautifully crafted, piano-led ballads, ‘Winter Song’. This is an album that taps straight into the core of Wood's formidable artistry.