L O V E I T V I O L E T Featuring John W. Sanders – PALATE CLEANSING SHARDS (Album Review)

John W. Sanders, the 67-year-old poet, painter, filmmaker, and frontman of L O V E I T V I O L E T, proves on Palate Cleansing Shards that artistic restlessness and emotional authenticity can coexist beautifully. Across nineteen original tracks, Sanders and his collaborators craft a textured body of work that stretches from folk to soul to experimental rock, unified by thoughtful lyricism and a deeply human voice, sometimes literal, sometimes poetic.

The album opens with Steamboat Smile, a folk blues tune with a 60s sensibility. Its echoing vocals feel nostalgic yet slightly ethereal, like a Joni Mitchell melody sung from inside a canyon. It’s a simple but evocative introduction, clear lyricism, organic guitar tones, and production that captures intimacy more than perfection. Will? continues this thread with Americana warmth, a slow pulse carried by a bassline and that now-familiar reverb-laced vocal tone. It feels modern in delivery but timeless in intent, its cohesion lying in emotional consistency rather than stylistic sameness.

Mr. Bell changes the current entirely, introducing grit and power. The rock and soul energy, reminiscent of Florence + The Machine’s emotive surge, gives the album a jolt. The anger is palpable, but it’s balanced by production that stays crisp and controlled. By contrast, Brady Willowfields’ Blue Eternities slows the mood again, a tender folk reflection sung by Sanders himself. The lyrics (“Gazing into autumn night from our boat against the pier”) show his poetic hand at work, turning quiet observation into warmth. The performance feels unhurried and genuine, its production understated but careful.

Dogtown expands the album’s palette with harmonica and piano, small instrumental choices that add emotional colour without clutter. All White Jury follows, a blues statement of power and social consciousness. The gravelly vocal tone, paired with politically charged lyrics and a slow tempo that lets each word land, makes it one of the standout performances on the record. It’s a reminder that Sanders’s strength lies in storytelling through restraint.

Southern Illinois Girls and Olivia Over the Grey return to familiar folk territory, well-executed, though the former feels more traditional than inspired. The latter benefits from the interplay between male and female vocals, creating a conversational dimension that deepens its emotional reach. Cypress Road offers tenderness and nostalgia through gentle guitar work and heartfelt lyricism, its sweetness anchored by subtle production choices that let it breathe.

As the record unfolds, I Wouldn’t Lie becomes a vocal high point. The singer’s passion is front and centre, her phrasing carrying both confidence and vulnerability. Lines like “I don’t make mistakes, mistakes make me” reflect the album’s ongoing balance between wisdom and rawness.

The tonal shift arrives with Trunks and Requiem for Becka Quinn. Both feel like experiments from another creative era, dark, electronic, slightly unsettling. Trunks channels the indie alt-pop strangeness of artists like Melanie Martinez, while Requiem ventures into rap with heavy autotune, a move that feels less cohesive within this collection. These tracks aren’t failures so much as curious side roads in a well-paved journey.

The Americana returns with Rather Go to Memphis, where the country-flavoured vocals and harmonies restore the album’s emotional centre. The same can’t quite be said for You Keep, which attempts a rap-rock fusion that doesn’t land, though the sung portions show promise. Can We Work It Out? redeems the blues energy, its harmonica and piano blending into a soulful reflection on identity and working-class struggle. The spoken-word delivery evolves into song naturally, underscoring Sanders’s roots in poetry and performance.

The closing stretch, The Iron Bouquet, Ruby’s Deep Hearted Azure Eyes, Space Within, and Cellophane Summer ’75, is where Palate Cleansing Shards finds its heartbeat again. The Iron Bouquet feels tender and sincere, while Ruby’s leans into gravelly rock textures, echoing Bob Dylan’s rough grace. Space Within slows everything down, pairing haunting harmonies with delicate pacing. Finally, Cellophane Summer ’75 ends the record on a note of reflective nostalgia, its lyrics painting faded memories with the softest brushstrokes. It’s the kind of ending that feels both final and open-ended, a perfect fade-out.

Across the album, the production is consistently attentive, rarely overworked. The reverb-heavy vocals might occasionally distance the listener, but they also define the record’s dreamy signature sound. The cohesion comes not from genre consistency, but from emotional throughlines: longing, reflection, ageing, love, and memory. The lyricism is often strong, at times profound, and even when the execution wavers, particularly in the rap-infused tracks, the intent remains deeply sincere.

Palate Cleansing Shards is aptly named. It feels like a resetting, a clearing away of noise to rediscover the raw essence of creativity. L O V E I T V I O L E T and John W. Sanders have made an album that doesn’t chase trends; it breathes, muses, and occasionally stumbles, but always with heart. It’s a deeply human record by an artist who’s lived enough to mean every word he sings.

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SCORE / Excellent – It’s a deeply human record, honest, and resonant in its emotional truth. In Palate Cleansing Shards, John W. Sanders and L O V E I T V I O L E T offer not just music, but a lifetime distilled into sound.

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