by Shannon Smith
Every songwriter creates stories in the hope of capturing love’s vocabulary without cliché. On The Art of Loving, Olivia Dean defines her heartfelt love stories. Each having soul, written from the inside out, melody and lyric arriving as one breath.
The record begins with “The Art of Loving (Intro),” where she uses multiple layers of her voice to set the thesis of intimacy as authorship. The transition to “Nice To Each Other” reframes courtesy as groove. Dean’s chorus hook is simple, cyclic, and affirming. Her vocal style has that soul that causes a revelation.
Her melodic instincts shine on “Lady Lady.” The [...]
Australian vocalist Alyson Murray is quickly establishing herself as an up and coming soul singer. Her seductive vocal styling is only matched by her acumen to create hook laden tunes that are memorable. Murray is a Graduate from the Victorian College of the Arts, 2015 with studies in jazz and improvisation. Throughout 2019, Murray started posting a series of A Capella videos on instagram, with hashtag #AMSESSIONS. This series started in New York and has captured the rawness of Murray’s songwriting. The culmination of this series as resulted in the latest single by Murray titled, “Come to Me” and features some of New York’s finest musicians, pianist [...]
