Golden-voiced diva Beth Orton will be drawing Worcester music fans down the A449 when she comes to Wolverhampton to promote her latest album, Daybreaker.

The title of Beth's third studio album is, according to her, a "made-up word to describe the sun coming up, the start of a new day and the sound of a record playing as the dawn breaks". Er, right.

The 10-track album's themes of hope, expectation, love and the passing of time are expressed in the imagery of nature.

Beth has described the first single Concrete Sky (co-written by ex-Smith Johnny Marr, featuring Ryan Adams) about "loving and being loved and the weight of your own expectations and insecurities."

Since Beth's 1996 debut album, Trailer Park, she has remained with the same band of core musicians.

Her gaggle of instrumentalists consist of Ted Barnes (guitar), Sean Read (keyboards), Ali Friend (bass) and Will Blanchard (drums), who form the perfect team to provide the backbone to Beth's distinctive sound.

Beth was born in rural Norfolk, and moved to East London with her family aged 14.

Thanks to her parents' record collection and her brothers' punk rock tastes, her bedroom soundtrack ranged from everything from Nick Drake to The Slits and The Stone Roses to Rickie Lee Jones.

A misspent youth on the dance floor led to Beth meeting wunderkind producer William Orbit and a musical collaboration began.

Over the next couple of years, Orbit helped steer Beth's path towards a solo career with the extremely low-key Japan-only release called Super Pinky Mandy.

From her work with Orbit she was approached by the fledgling Chemical Brothers and contributed the standout vocal track Alive Alone on their 1995 debut album.

Beth then spent a brief stint fronting

freak-beat jazz combo Red Snapper, providing vocals for two singles called Snapper and In Deep.

After that, she set about the serious business of finding a band and recording her first album.

Beth's second LP, Central Reservation, was released in 1999.

The album was seen as a huge progression and, as well as being hugely well received in her home country, brought her major league attention in the United States.

After several months in a tour bus, Beth eventually succumbed to a stomach ailment she's suffered from since childhood and took the opportunity to return to London for some home comforts and physical recuperation.

At the start of 2000, she picked up her Brit Award as Britain's most beloved female artist and submerged herself in the process of writing and recording Daybreaker.

Catch her at Wolverhampton Civic Hall on Tuesday, March 25.

Tickets, from the box office on 01902 552121, cost £15, subject to a booking fee.