Monthly Archives: July 2018

Reviews

Collaborative Review – Rhyan Sinclair – Barnstormer

1 Comment

This is one of the most fun collaborations we’ve ever gotten to do because we were able to discover a new artist together and fall in love with her music right from the start.

Conversation

Megan: So this is cool, we’ve got a debut record from a 17-year-old songwriter from Kentucky. Lots of cool songwriters coming out of Appalachia these days, so you definitely have to check something like this out. And it’s great when we get to talk about debuts, because it’s not only about that album, but also a brand-new artist to love. So what jumps out to you about Rhyan Sinclair herself? Why should people check her out?

Brianna: Well, she’s got a very distinctive sound. Rhyan Sinclair reminds me of Miranda Lambert vocally. More than that, though, she is a very good writer. You definitely can’t tell she’s so young by these lyrics. They make her seem a lot older, and these songs are very real because of that. You feel many different emotions in this album, that’s for sure.

Megan: The voice hit me too. The tone is sort of similar to Ashley Monroe and to Clare Bowen who played Scarlett on Nashville, but you’re right, the other night when you said Miranda, it hit me. I can definitely hear that in her accent and her phrasing. Like early Miranda, from Kerosene and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. To that end, we both found some vocal imperfection in it. You forgive that because she’s 17, and she’ll certainly have time to develop.
As far as the writing, yes, she definitely impresses me. Some of those lines are just outstanding. I agree about the variety in emotions and tempos, although I tend to prefer her slower songs. I do think it’s cool that with such a soft voice, she still does the up-tempo stuff and does it well.

Brianna: What I found most refreshing about the varied tempos on this album is how, for the most part, there’s a slower song and then a faster one. It keeps things from dragging. I like her faster songs quite a bit better, but it’s true that a lot of the slower songs are quite deep and emotional. In short, I think she’s good at whatever tempo she chooses.
I do agree that there are some vocal imperfections, but I’m really excited to see where she goes from here. Once I got past all of that, I really got into this album.

Megan: Based on that, it sounds like our highlights will probably be different. So what were some of yours?

Brianna: I think my favorite song was “The Hourglass.” I loved how the lyrics tell of making the most of the time you have, and yet that time still flies by. It’s life. I don’t think it gets more real than that. I really liked “Barnstormer,” too. Sure, the theme of being a wanderer has been done before, but I like this song because she talks about the ways people see someone like her. I also really liked “The Sad Song.” She says she’s writing it because that’s the only way she can really get her feelings out. That’s got to be true for many songwriters, I’m sure. “Retrograde” is really good too, because she’s tired of being under the weather, as she says. Skeleton Sam” was a really good example of a fast song about a darker topic, I thought. In this case, the subject of the lyrics was a ghost. It’s not often that a singer can sing about something dark at such a fast tempo and make it work, but Rhyan Sinclair does. Finally, I quite liked “I Can’t Sleep.” Again, not being able to sleep do to having things on our minds is something most, if not all, of us have had to deal with at some point.
What were the highlights of this album for you?

Megan: “I Can’t Sleep” was easily my favorite. There’s something so beautiful about the melody of that song that really goes with the lyrics and makes something special. I also liked “Kentucky Night Sky,” and it went well in the track placement after “I Can’t Sleep.” “Selfishly, Heartlessly” was a really nice breakup song; I love that line: “you’re selfishly, heartlessly doing just fine,” something we can all relate to, that we wish the other person was hurting as much as we were. “Barnstormer” and “Free at Last” were my two favorites in the faster category, but mostly, I liked the slow stuff. And I love the way she hits high notes almost out of nowhere. We talked about the vocal imperfections, but the way she can just soar to all these beautiful high notes, even singing them softly as opposed to belting them out, is just effortless and makes those songs and those moments better to me.

Brianna: I do agree with you about that line in “Selfishly, Heartlessly.” She’s got a way of making you feel empathetic, and like the experiences talked about in these songs are ones you can relate to. And as for her vocal ability, I have to agree that she does a great job with those high notes. She’s very subtle about them, and that makes them all the more impacting.

Megan: Yep, you’re right. So I think this is a really strong debut, but I do think it could have been better. I’d have like to have seen it trimmed from 14 songs to 12, and then more time could have been spent to polish it up. Like we said, there’s vocal imperfections and things, and she’ll definitely have lots of time to develop, but it does feel like it could have been a little tighter. We’d probably disagree about what songs to trim because “Retrograde” was actually one of my least favorites, but I just think it would have been better a little shorter and handled with a bit more care.

Brianna: I agree. If a couple songs had been trimmed, I do think the whole album would have been more solid. This, along with some vocal imperfections and a few times where I found the production a little weak, are my complaints about this project. Still, the writing is just too good overall, the tempos keep this from being boring, and Rhyan Sinclair has some very well-done singing moments on here. I’m rating it a very solid 7.

Megan: I’m really excited about this artist. I always love finding something new and fresh and cool to talk about, and Rhyan Sinclair is the kind of artist that makes this outlet fun. I love her voice, the tone and especially all those lovely high notes–we don’t have enough country women nailing notes in the stratosphere like that, that’s very impressive. Her potential as a writer is there in spades as well. I do think the album feels a bit too long and a little rushed in the production aspect; they could have taken some more time here to really polish up some of these songs. But what a great debut record, and Rhyan Sinclair should definitely be on your radar. 7.5 from me.

Brianna: I completely agree, we need more artists with this kind of vocal range. I’m excited to see where Rhyan Sinclair takes her music next. If you’re looking for a new traditional female country artist, look no further than Rhyan Sinclair and Barnstormer.

Ratings

Megan: 7.5
Brianna: 7

Buy the Album on Amazon

Concerts

Jamie Lin Wilson Killed it Live at The Blue Door

1 Comment

I’ve been trying to go to more live shows all year, and just last week, after seeing Jason Boland, Mike McClure, and Cody Canada in an acoustic song swap, I noted that I’d covered seven shows already this year on the way to the goal of twelve–but I’d only covered one woman, Courtney Patton. This was certainly not intentional, but it did seem weird to me looking back, considering I do listen to a lot of women artists and feature them all the time on this site. But this is how it happened, and I was hoping to find some more women to support live. Then, on Friday, (6/29_, at around 5 PM, I saw Jamie Lin Wilson’s tweet that she’d made it to Oklahoma City in a borrowed van and would be playing The Blue Door that night. So with only three hours’ notice, I went; I’ve seen her before, but never as a headliner, and I knew it would be a good show and a cool thing to write about.

As I say, I’ve seen Jamie Lin Wilson live before–this actually was the fourth time after twice at Medicine Stone and once opening for Turnpike. She also graciously did an interview with me two years ago at Medicine Stone, and among other things, she talked about how many women artists shine in listening rooms, as opposed to in arenas and at festivals where alcohol and partying are driving factors. She proved this true in her own case, as although she was great on the main stage that first year, she seemed to bring something even more special to the smaller, more intimate stage on which she performed in 2017. The Blue Door, as I’ve noted before, is great for songwriters like this, offering something unique and intimate and frankly unparalleled. It’s listening rooms like this one where you feel like you’re just chilling with the artist, where everything feels informal and personal.

What Jamie Lin Wilson has that sets her apart from many songwriters, both men and women, who thrive in these types of venues is stage presence and charisma. She’s happy joking with her band and with the crowd, ruining the joke of why the chicken crossed the road, teasing her electric guitar player about borrowing all of her stuff in order to actually come on the road and play for her, and telling us about the line dancers in France that are obsessed with one of Courtney Patton’s early songs. But between all these lighthearted, fun moments, she’s got songs with such depth of feeling, like the bittersweet “Dusty Shoes” or the resigned “Just Like Heartache.” I’ve seen her do this song before, but I am always amazed by her version of Tom Petty’s “Room at the Top.” She worked in some Trishas songs as well, like “Little Sweet Cigars” and the closer, “drive.”

And yes, we did hear some songs from the new album coming out in October. She commented that she observed a lot for this record, just watched things happen around her and wrote them down. We heard a song about her daughter’s reaction watching the clouds pass over during the first cold front and another inspired by her friend who gets philosophical and poetic whenever he drinks too much. I’m so happy to hear that she recorded “Oklahoma stars,” a song I fell in love with last September at Medicine Stone. Evan Felker of the Turnpike Troubadours wrote the last verse, and Turnpike recorded it on their latest album. Everyone knows my obsession with Turnpike, but if you read that review, you also know I didn’t like their version of this song. It’s probably a biased opinion because I had Jamie Lin’s in my head already and an idea of what it should sound like, but I had been really looking forward to the song and then found it to be the only track I didn’t like on the Troubadours’ record. I still love Jamie Lin’s version, and I can’t wait to hear it on the new album.

I’ve been blessed in 2018 with not having been to a bad show, and i try to keep these little pieces positive anyway, not like formal reviews so much as spotlights of cool live music. That said, Jamie Lin Wilson’s show has definitely been one of the highlights of the whole series. And in the bigger picture, where the spirit of this whole exercise has been to support live music itself, her voice and these songs offer something in a live setting that can’t be found in the studio. I feel like a broken record saying that in so many of these pieces, but damn it, it just keeps being proven to me time and time again.

Best Live Songs: “Dusty Shoes,” “Room at the Top,” “Little Sweet Cigars,” “Just Like Heartache,” “Oklahoma stars,” “Whistling”