Jesse Harris & The Ferdinandos

Nora Jones's cup runneth over right into Jesse Harris's lap. The Brooklyn songwriter behind much of Jones's Grammy-winning Come Away With Me no doubt benefited from the exposure to lift his own band from indie status to become major label players. The Secret Sun is the band's first label release, their fourth overall, and continues to spotlight Harris's gift for arranging words, melodies and chords in favourable orders. Harris's musical heroes include the Band and Dylan and many of the album's tracks reveal this. "Just a Photograph," a song you'll swear you've been singing in the shower for years, and "All My Life" (featuring organ by Chris Brown) are strongly rooted in this tradition and even come off a bit like Jakob Dylan's best material. It's hard to believe The Secret Sun was recorded, mostly live in the studio, in just three days; three painstaking months would sound closer to the mark.