This is VANESSA PETERS' latest album release, her first in three years, and it was worth the wait, as this Texas based singer /ongwriter has delivered a great album of upbeat folk and pop, with some really clever lyrics.
The album was recorded in Austin, Texas, and features Vanessa on guitars and vocals, John Dufilho on drums, Jason Garner on bass, Joe Reyes on guitars, and Rip Rowan (who produced the album) on keyboards and drums. The album was funded using Kickstarter, the funding platform for creative projects, and although all Vanessa's previous albums have been self-financed via fan funding, this is a major step forward in terms of publicity and availability.
The album has eleven tracks, all of which will broadly fall within the folk/folk-rock and folk/pop genre(s). The opening track 'A Good Judge' gets the proceedings off to a swinging start. A folk rock tune based around guitars and keys, this is a song that gets to the heart of relationship problems and the aftermath of splitting up: - “And the trouble was, you never had that many words for me/ I was left to guess how you felt and if you wanted me to leave/ And not wanting me to leave, is not the same thing as wanting me to stay/ So I had the great debate between me and me, and then I walked away” I liked this one, as in the end of this tale, there are no winners only losers, and virtually everyone can relate to that somewhere down the line.
'Bright Red' which follows is a bright, upbeat poppy guitar based song, which talks about a long hot summer. It's a bit of a 'coming of age' song as well, and as a result it works really well: - “My shoulders turned freckled and brown, and my favourite pair of shoes melted into the ground/ And we drove around with the windows downand our bodies drenched in sweat/ That's a year I will never forget.”
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Other tracks on the album that really work are 'Grateful', another upbeat poppy song with slight new wave overtones. This would be an ideal single. Once again, the lyrics are well crafted: - “And you can ask the preacher if he can pull a man out of his slide/ And he will tell you with bright eyes, man's a victim of his pride/ We should be grateful, just to be alive, dig your heels in, get through the day/ We should be grateful, just to be alive, your armour's heavy, but try to be brave.”
'Favourite Day' (I'm using the English spelling on this one) is another cool track, which comes across not a million miles away from Suzanne Vega's earlier work: “Have you ever bit your tongue and made it bleed?/ Has your voice trailed off in mid-story trying not to speak of me?/ And when she asks about the picture I wonder what you'll tell her,/ 'Cause the world's gone public, and you can't hide me forever.”
Overall, I thought that this was a refreshing album, with some really well-observed, thought out lyrics. Vanessa herself states “I wasn't trying to cloak my lyrics in shades of grey. I was trying to tell stories in black and white.” And certainly on this album, she's more than suceeded in her aim.
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