Videos

Chastity Brown – I Left Home

• 22nd Mar 2013

Back-Road Highways is the exciting first UK release from Tennessee raised, Minnesota based musician Chastity Brown. Her track ʻAfterYouʼ was recently featured in the new BBC/HBO film, “Mary & Martha” The film stars Hilary Swank and aired on March 1.

Chastityʼs style is a beautiful mix of Gospel, Roots & Soul, Jazz, Blues & Country, and it couldnʼt work better. Chastity channels songs that are born deep in the American bone, the hunger, desperation and confidence that runs through our times.

Sheʼll put a spell on you. Sweet as molasses and woodsmoke, clear and burning as summer sun, Chastity Brown casts magic. Her voice brings you to the crossroads with every turn, warms, comforts and challenges you. She is the inheritor of Leadbelly, Nina Simone, Bonnie Raitt and Roberta Flack. She is past, present and future.

Chastity, whose mother grew up in a large Irish family in Boston, and whose father was an African- American jazz/blues musician, was born in the north-easterly state of New Hampshire, and moved down to Union City in Tennessee when she was seven years old. Growing up near Memphis, just an earshot away from Appalachia, Chastity was influenced by Roots music from an early age. When she first began writing music she struggled with this influence as she was not exposed to many Soul musicians writing Folk music. Growing up in a full Gospel church was where Chastity found her voice and passion.

ʻLearning about Leadbellyʼs influence on Woody Guthrie opened up a whole new world to me, prior to this knowledge I felt alone in the music I was creating. I did not know how to reconcile my storytelling impulse with my Soul-inflected vocal upbringingʼ

With Back-Road Highways Chastity pushes her own natural talent even farther, to stunning effect. Back-Road Highways, co-produced by Fred Cannon (who has previously worked with the likes of Prince, Queen and Stevie Wonder), was recorded at the venerable Helsinki South studios in Nashville, Tennessee with the support of her new label Creative and Dreams Music Network, giving Chastity a return to Southern warmth.

Chastity pulls from a diverse cross-section of talent for her live shows, playing with guitarist Robert Mulrennan, percussionist Greg Schutte, keyboardist deVon Gray (Heiruspecs) and bass player Jef Sundquist (Hildur Victoria), resulting in restless, electrifying and completely enveloping performances that never want to stop and linger long after the last note has quieted. A talent like this doesnʼt appear overnight. It takes travel, it takes guts. It takes chance, work and luck. It takes love. Get ready to love Chastity Brown.