Star by Valley James (Side A)

I love that I have no idea how I first heard of Valley James, but her name itself caught my attention.

Back in the spring Valley James was a flame-haired femme fatale posting content that was more than slightly reminiscent of David Lynch movies. There was no way I would not be writing about her. I know from her brilliant Instagram account that Valley has faced adversity in her life but I have tried to stick to the music in this album deep-dive. You can read the rest elsewhere.

One of the big draws for me into the world of Valley James is that she has created a complete character and world for her music to inhabit. I can’t pretend to know the real Valley James, but I feel that I know this character in a deep way. She features throughout Hollywood cinema history in film noir, in black and white Westerns or silent gothic movies, even in European cinema. Indeed, her tagline on Instagram is simply goth country 🖤. Whoever this girl is, she is essentially immortal. I don’t know if Valley will cringe or swoon to be compared to Lana Del Rey… so I am not saying that. Not after one album.

Star

One thing is for sure: her story has just begun. Valley sings about a burning valley, a word that is more loaded for her than it is for most of us. This is ethereal, winter, night music of the highest calibre. There’s an acoustic guitar, actually not all that much music at all. This album is a great example of less being more.

The room Valley creates in the music emphasizes her voice and the lyrics. This was always going to be my cup of tea. And now she’s singing of velvet. I think the key question the song asks (is there life after death?) is central to much of country-inspired music. This is a very strong opening to a very strong debut album.

Crushed Velvet

No Lynch fan can ever take the world velvet at face value. Blue Velvet is one of his most famous films, if not the most successful in many ways. When I wrote about Valley’s song Electric Blue in the summer, the cover of which features her in a blue velvet jacket, I chose to believe this was another Lynch homage.

This song features a dark Spanish-style guitar extended intro. It is labelled as the cinematic version and ‘cinematic’ is very much a word that describes all of these songs. The catchy repetition in the chorus ‘that’s what cowgirls do’ is atmospheric: does she see herself as one of the cowgirls featured here?

Lucky Strike

This is a quicker, lighter song, very catchy and an obvious single. The biggest question is just whether this is primarily about the cigarette brand or something deeper. It is very much the latter.

Married 22 in a sweetheart fit
Divorced by 23 in a shotgun blitz
And oh, how the town talked

Pawned off the ring for my first guitar
Black telecaster with a broken heart
Got high like a sparrow flies

If that’s not the opening sequence to the best unmade film noir or Western in history I don’t know what is.

Voices at the End of the Line

This is a swingy, singy 1950s classic that instantly reminded me of Roy Orbison. Coincidentally Roy appeared on the Blue Velvet movie soundtrack with his song In Dreams. Is this a close relationship that has been forced into being a distance, telephone-based one? Are we to take her that literally? Probably not, although the video does take that route.

Baby, take of your mask
‘cause I wanna see you one last time
‘cause you used to know me and I used to shine
now we’re just voices at the end of the line

Any Fool Will Do

This is the prelude to a solo night out on the town, on an out-of-character bender. Perhaps for tonight any fool will seem to do, but she also seems to know that tonight won’t provide any final answers. She just needs to unwind, kick back a little.

I have held back on any editorial reflections on just how much I love this album. I don’t know why I held off writing about it so long because I have been listening quietly all summer. Perhaps I realised it was really an album for cold, dark, rainy nights.

Perhaps I wasn’t sure how much of this music is about Valley IRL and how much is about the character she has so deftly created. I now realise it doesn’t matter. There is a time for the right brain and time for the left, and this is the time to just listen. The best news I have is that this is only half the album.

Valley James is active on Instagram as well as TikTok and has some wonderful videos on YouTube. She is playing the legendary Pappy and Harriet’s in a festival line-up that includes Chaparelle on 16th November 2025.