On her third album at the young age of 21, Marling is one of those singers that with every release we’ve slightly felt she’s too young for the content of her songs. However the voice and maturity shows she is an ‘old head on young shoulders’ and there isn’t a degree of pretension in her music. If anyone can prove the phrase ‘age is just a number’, it’s Laura.

In ‘A Creature I Don’t Know’ the young singer’s sound has progressed to a whole new level; the folky, acoustic tones of her previous two albums (Alas, I Cannot Swim and I Speak Because I Can) have grown into a more confident country-esque sound which feels like a development in both confidence and maturity for Marling. This has been a long time coming given the size of her audience at Glastonbury this year and has now been added to by a sell-out cathedral tour of the UK. Her confidence is entirely deserved, the power of her lyrics, voice and gentle guitar are unmistakable, this is Marling through and through. This album has a more mature feel to the songs as it focuses largely on the personality of Laura herself, infact opening track ‘The Muse’ sums up the feel of the album. ‘A Creature’ is more of a discussion of herself as a person rather than a lover/girlfriend that ‘Alas’ and ‘I Speak’ are full of. Some could even say she is heading down the route of the folk greats like Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen.

At a first listen, this third album isn’t quite as powerful as the two previous and it seems to be lacking the several album stunners like ‘Blackberry Stone’, ‘Failure’ and ‘Ghosts’ but Marling’s albums have always been growers, and i’m sure ‘A Creature I Don’t Know’ is no different. So is definitely worth giving it the time to let it grow and we will see and hear beautiful things from this young woman. Laura Marling is one to watch; she has managed to make it in a industry currently dominated by pop while retaining her own style and she deserves all the success I hope is coming to her.