To me she's yet another one of those female singers with incredibly irritating voices that are clogging up the charts like so much effluent. Kooky and showy, over-emotive and influenced by the hideous Mariah Carey Textbook of Proper Singing. Pass.

Adele is an old fashioned bluesy singer, absolutely nothing like the "million notes a bar but not hitting one that matters" school of modern vocalist. She sings a song straight and to my ears at least means it,

...where's the over emoting on this one? Subtle and soulful in my opinion...

I don't agree. It's not so much Careyism as as sort of neo-Bonnie Tyler approach, if you think about it. Rather too much belting involved for my taste, but, hell, at least she's not Duffy, so I'd convert Patrick's pass into a pass mark. The song's got a tune and she sings it well. (Whether I'd buy it is something else entirely, but lumping her in with rentamelisma divas seems a bit uncharitable, that's all.)

what Patrick means, there is an sameness about many of these girl singers more Winehouse than Carey in my opinion. But there is something about Adele that makes me believe she'll be the one still doing it in 20 years time and still being spoken of in glowing terms.

I think this is rather good, "Chasing Pavements" with Paul Weller

I will give her new lp a listen on the strength of this tune. I believe she may have a great record in her, although maybe not yet. Perhaps with the right collaborator..?

and what bits of the new album I've heard seem pretty good. It is more Amy W than Mariah C.
The absolute truth is that Amy is on a plane far above Adele and Duffy and the like and if she can get her life back on track instead of turning into a caricature Diva/Victim a la The Camden Holiday the better.

It's all those moments when the voice seems to be about to crack. And the deliberately singing slightly off the note.

I'm not a musician so I don't know how else to explain it but it's true that a lot of singers are adopting this style and it's a bit irritating.

When i first heard it on the radio - I too thought it was KT Tunstall.

I quite like the record and will probably have a listen to her new LP on the strength of it - thats all !

New album worth a listen, especially as it was only £3 to download it from Amazon. There are a couple of really good piano led ballads, good luck to her she's ok.

Duffy. Plan B. Adele. Pixie Lott. Gabriella Cilmi. I don't what you call that genre of music (English soul?), but I can't bear it.

especially her over-anglicising of certain words ("Keep me thinking that we could have had it ooll") but I think she has real potential. Perhaps not the finished article yet but way, way better than Duffy et al. Rolling in the Deep is an awesome tune and thanks to carl adlam's tipoff I've headed straight over to a certain online retailer to pick the album up for £3.99.

She is a damn fine singer.

Has three good songs on it. The rest are overblown ballads that just make me think of X-Factor. I find the album unlistenable as a whole. She needs to learn when to belt it out and when to show a little calm.

that the singing is a little mannered - there is a slight put on exaggerated emotion, like over acting, in her style, but the strength of the tune and quality of the music and production is enough for me to overlook that and enjoy it as a record. It sounded great on the radio when I was driving.

I'm not actually particularly keen on this retro movement - Duffy, Winehouse etc. and I thought I'd had enough of it, but this record seems a bit more contemporary to me. Winehouse I find is a little too self consciously retro on Back To Black - well I suppose that's down to Mark Ronson as much as anything. I didn't really expect to enjoy an Adele record but I like this one a lot.

She was interviewed on a Guardian podcast a couple of years ago and was talking about how she had covered "a really obscure Bob Dylan song no one has heard", which was 'Make You Feel My Love' from Time Out Of Mind. I might be wrong, but I thought quite a lot of people had bought Time Out Of Mind.

'Rolling In The Deep' doesn't grab me and I wasn't fussed on 'Chasing Pavements' either I'm afraid, but I do like that one she did on Jools recently (posted above).

The first thing I thought was Adele must have been listening to Feist's version of Sea Lion Woman quite a lot.
Good song though.

should first clean this woman's shoes

..nobody's mentioned Joss Stone yet.

Coat gotten....