EMILY EASTERLY: Cole

Emily Easterly

Cole

© 2002 Emily Easterly (656605932224)

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What a redhead should sound like.

tracks

1 Concrete Floor
2 Tuesday
3 Win
4 All
5 Bad Luck
6 Bound to You
7 Creature
8 Stubborn

notes

Emily Easterly is not part of a trend. Her sound involves the combination of songwriting skills and the influence of independent rock. Introspective and insightful, the simplicity of her chords and the striking juxtaposition of lyrics leave the songs laid out for the listener to figure out for themselves and to weave into their own lives. Her wispy, weathered vocals have a light texture sounding confidently timid. It's original, creative and not artificial because its Emily making her own way and doing it exactly how she wants to.

Emily has made her rounds in the Richmond, VA music scene where she grew up while also making a name for herself in Miami, FL as she attends the University of Miami (School of Music) majoring in classical guitar. Emily finished her debut EP, Assembling Emily?in June of 2001. Recorded at Sound of Music Studios in Richmond, she got the chance to work with Johnny Hickman of the band Cracker (Virgin Records), Alan Weatherhead of the band Sparklehorse (Capital Records) as well as Miguel Urbiztondo of the bands Maki and Koester.

Her sophomore effort, Cole was completed in July of 2002. Also recorded at Sound of Music in Richmond, these eight new songs offer a more mature side of Emily. The songs are a lush layering of sounds including pedal steel guitars that sound like keyboards, sweeping synth sounds and electric guitars. The album title refers to Emily's middle name in an attempt to make a reference between the significant understatement and importance of a middle name and these eight songs. A middle name is very much a part of a person but it is constantly overshadowed and never in the forefront. Coming from a place that is buried away, these songs surface with the release of Cole?

reviews

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  • Smashing! Full of talented, hard edged, likeable music!
    author: Christopher Sundseth

    This CD contains an amazing mix of sounds and tempos. And the sound feels like it comes from a very seasoned veteran. The melodies can be haunting or catchy. I recommend it to anyone, since it seems to have something for everyone!

  • author: rene alvarez, miami street magazine

    Middle names don't usually serve much purpose, and are just embarrassing details on driver's licenses. But it's their ''buried away'' nature that prompted singer / songwriter Emily Easterly to name her new eight-song CD after her middle name, Cole. ''Middle names are very much a part of a person, but not in the forefront,'' she says. ``Which is the way I feel about these songs.'' Co-produced by Easterly and Miguel Urbiztondo (drummer for Tweaker and Koester) and engineered by Alan Weatherhead (who's played with Cracker, Tim Buckley and Sparklehorse), Cole is a promising mixture of Fiona Apple (without the anger) and Mazzy Star's quiet seductiveness. The songs are not dark, but evoke daily things that barely register: the simple sensuality of an unmade bed, shafts of light in a shuttered room, the quiet spaces in conversation. Revolving around the themes of desire and frustration, Easterly sings as if, to get to her destination, she needs to circumvent uncooperative walls and flesh, as in the lead track ''Concrete Floor'' (sample line: ``Wishing here on a concrete floor, hoping you could make it through a cement door''). Easterly is at her best on the mildly desperate ''Tuesday'' (''But it wouldn't be hard this Tuesday, to make enough room for you to stay''), and the soft brushes of ``Bad Luck'' (``You and me, just driving away, from a bad, bad day''), are as soothing as fingers running through your hair. Cole is a good album, and a promising harbinger of things to come from Easterly, a relative newcomer to the scene.

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