Album Review

Amelia Curran – Spectators

• 6th Feb 2013

The excellent Spectators is the third album from singer songwriter Amelia Curran. Already released in her native Canada, UK fans now have the chance to hear this fine collection of ten exquisite songs. Curran is known for both her tender and expressive lyrics and a voice that is warm and evocative, and that combination of great songs delivered beautifully marks this album as a must have.

Curran’s second album, 2009’s Hunter Hunter, won her the Juno Award (a Canadian Grammy) for Best Roots and Traditional Album. Spectators is, if anything, even better, with its slightly more rounded arrangements that take her work from its folk roots and evolve it closer to mainstream territory. But the production is subtle enough that the occasional string and brass parts and the poppy edge to a couple of songs do not detract from the depth of the songwriting.

The opening track Years grows over a soft organ sound, a lament for time past with “a million regrets” that ends on a hopeful note: “But it’s nowhere near sunset, baby we’ve got years.” The change to optimism is subtle and sets a philosophical tone that the second track takes further. What Will You Be Building opens with a jazz trumpet melody, but the lyrics are delivered over a starker backing, asking us to consider what the legacy of our lives will be when we have gone. Powerful stuff.

The Modern Man starts as a simpler sound with more of a folk feel, fingerpicked guitar backing the vocals along with occasional percussion and organ. Strings create atmosphere and a pedal steel guitar adds a wistful tone to a track that has a lot going on, yet never overwhelms the soft vocal.

Blackbird On Fire has an upbeat, almost jaunty, feel. “I loved you like a meteor” it opens, a lyrical love song filled with striking similes. The strings return for The Great Escape, a cello giving a deep and sonorous opening to a slower track with a reflective air. The title track, Strangers, follows and Curran’s voice hints at the power she possesses as it rises for the chorus.

Soft Wooden Towers is a gentle folk song with the strings again backing the vocal, before the stand out track of the album, San Andreas Fault. A heartbreakingly simple song of love gone wrong, the imagery at its centre is elegant and painful at the same time. A male backing harmony is added for the chorus and the contrasting vocals work well.

In A Town (200 Days) has a faster pace than most, its folky feel and poetic lyrics telling of “searching for the good light in one thousand shades of grey.” The closing Face On The News ends the album on a slower note with a fine vocal performance, deep and emotional.

There is a dark edge to many of Amelia Curren’s songs. Even those which are more radio friendly still have undercurrents of heartbreak and despair to them. But it is handled so deftly that this never becomes a depressing album. There is a lightness to the sound that tempers the words, and her fine voice, its husky edge adding authenticity as she delivers her lyrics with grace, gives beauty throughout.

Spectators is a very good collection of songs from a talented songwriter and singer. Already very successful back home in Canada, this album should bring Amelia Curran’s undoubted talents to the attention of many more in the UK.

Venue: Spectators
Support Band: Blue Rose