Jessica Hernandez understands better than most how to craft a vision through sound. Each track we’ve heard from her, especially those off the five-song EP Demons from last year, is a musical universe entirely unto itself. She makes magic with her songwriting, striking vocals, and backing band’s arrangements — Demons draws much of its power from the Deltas’ deft sense of atmosphere — and has the makings of a star destined for much bigger things, which despite an abortive period with the Blue Note label, could still be Hernandez’s ultimate fate.
A native of Detroit’s historic Mexicantown district, Hernandez started making music when a Columbia College classmate offered her access to a studio outside of Kansas City, where she would write and record late at night. From there she moved around the country, eventually ending up in California, where she lives with her boyfriend of four years. Wanderlust winds its way into her music, as well, which spans from blues and country to jazz and rock.
Yet on her first full-length release, Secret Evil, there’s “No Place Left to Hide.” The title of the LP’s opener states this clearly, and if that weren’t enough to convince you, Hernandez drives the point home: “Hunt you down / Going nowhere / No place left to hide.” Added to the party is a foxhound of pounding bass and resounding drums that corners you. And where would you even want to run, given this album’s eclectic mix of styles? Better just to give yourself over to this Secret Evil and turn up the volume.
Drawing from the production work on previous EPs including the aforementioned Demons, Secret Evil throws in an assortment of musical castaways and cutouts, from syncopated Latin dance rhythms and cabaret’s dramatic affect to slow-burning deep soul smolder and goth’s dark romance.
Hernandez’s vocals, which pull focus even when displaying self-control, float from polar vortex to heat wave. She’s got range, to be sure, yet there’s no sense of showing off for its own sake. Songs mutate and take new shapes; in kind, Hernandez’s voice molds to the music. But however elastic the sound becomes, it never feels uncontrolled. Everything bends to the will of the Deltas, who effortlessly switch styles with panache and aplomb.
What connects the disparate strands is a lasting impression of deep-set melancholy that lingers after and loiters within individual tracks, much like a fragrance. That olfactory allusion makes perfect sense for Jessica Hernandez and the Deltas, who demonstrate a firm commitment to developing every note of their work, whether it is of the sonic or scented variety.
Hernandez’s lyrics match her expressive voice, even at their most ambiguous; though the meaning of her words isn’t always readily apparent, it’s still possible to glimpse hints of a narrative in many of her songs (“There’s a cold-hearted man/ Lock the door to the room/ Save the ones that you can”).
She often zooms in on bodily states to show how they inform emotional ones. For example, several tracks lean on corporeal imagery to reveal Hernandez’s carnal desires: “Take my hand, I’ll show you the pheromone gland.” (Despite the constant comparisons, Amy Winehouse never explored sexuality quite so viscerally.)
Moreover, these anatomical references gain even more currency when placed against the backdrop of the Deltas’ evocative compositions, casting Hernandez as a blues-soaked tumbleweed come to reanimate the saloons of a gold rush ghost town.
First single “Tired Oak” closes with “I would always try to fight for something,” which sums up everything driving the warring factions within Hernandez. Having battled for so long to release this album, she’s neither ceasing fire nor getting burned again.
There’s a torch song ambiance coursing throughout the entire record, though the light Hernandez carries acts as both beacon and weapon. Yet however much things evolved on the surface of the sonic planet this warrior goddess created, its core is still intact. Once she saw that truth, there was no place left to hide. “I got caught up lying to myself,” she belts out on the newly rerecorded “Caught Up.”
Jessica Hernandez may have thought she exorcised all her Demons, but a Secret Evil remained, and now her song – and our world – will never be the same.
Stream Secret Evil below: