SAY Award 2023's nominees explained: Becky Sikasa – Twelve Wooden Boxes
As 2023's Scottish Album Of The Year Award draws near, we're penning some handy primers on each shortlisted album to help you wade through this avalanche of musical goodness. Today we're chatting Becky Sikasa’s sadness-and-chill EP Twelve Wooden Boxes
Act: Becky Sikasa
Album: Twelve Wooden Boxes
How it sounds: Soulful ballads lie at the core of this EP, bolstered by Sikasa’s soaring vocals. A piano and her powerhouse voice carry these songs through the world-weary sadness of everyday living, downbeat and self-pitying while also celebrating those people in life who pick you up, brush you off and help you struggle on. It’d be a slight EP without the dynamism of Sikasa’s vocal range, which can transition with buttery smooth agility from modish balladry to slinky neo-soul with a balletic precision.
Top track: ‘Win’, a relatable plea for life to cut Sikasa some slack.
Do you come here often? Sikasa is enjoying her first nomination this year.
Why Becky Sikasa should win: This earnest search for personal salvation feels like a solid starting point for Sikasa. At its best, Twelve Wooden Boxes is relatable soul with a lot of heart.
The SAY Award winner will be announced on Thursday 26 October. Becky Sikasa will play Edinburgh’s Summerhall on Friday 3 November, London’s Outernet on Thursday 25 January and Glasgow’s Saint Luke’s on Sunday 28 January.
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