In 2007, for the release of Leona Lewis's first album, Sony conjured a persuasive aura of instant class around a singer who in plain view of more than 10 million X Factor viewers had clearly been a Pizza Hut waitress less than 18 months earlier. The carefully stage-managed ascent to diva status involved a succession of impressive frocks but the centrepiece was Bleeding Love, a modern standard with international appeal which allowed Simon Cowell to present Leona to American audiences as the UK's new sensation; then, when America took the bait, he reinvigorated her UK profile by trumpeting her phenomenal US success.

Unusually for an X Factor graduate, there was actually something at risk if the second album didn't work, but Echo hits its target. A handful of upbeat numbers – including an unexpected foray into frothy high-speed electro – pull Leona back from the brink of boring, while I Got You is an impressive distant relative of Bleeding Love.

Stop Crying Your Heart Out is a slight misfire: while the high points of Echo are every bit as sophisticated as the marketing would have us believe, Stop Crying… pushes the album in the direction of self-parody.