REVIEW: Brielle Brown — The Well (EP)
2021 is the year of the American rookie, and if you didn’t think so ahead of listening to the debut EP from Brielle Brown, The Well, I’ve got a feeling you’re going to after soaking up the record’s six unique songs.
Driven by the lead vocal Brown sews into its most dynamic harmonies, The Well touches on themes of parenthood, climate change, divinity, and the manner in which an artist cultivates their identity outside of their influences, all while sticking to an instrumental foundation as appealing to folkies as it is fans of indie rock and alternative country. There’s no stopping her momentum behind the mic when she starts in on the verses of the title track, “Let the Water,” and “Skylark’s Tune;” she’s got such an unspoken bond with the material she’s playing for us that she doesn’t have to put in a lot of strength to produce a wallop with her words. Next to Claire Means, Grey DeLisle, and Casey Ahern, I think this young singer/songwriter represents a new strain of Americana we cannot afford to ignore this summer — nor should we consider anything less than an echo of contemporary culture.
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Compositional conservatism can be abused to no end when you’ve got a less than erudite player at the helm of a project, but this never becomes an issue for Brown in The Well; contrarily, her self-awareness benefits from the minimalist influences she adopts for “She’s Come to Sing” and “Skylark’s Tune” brilliantly. The only area of the music that she ever allows to slip into indulgence is her singing, which is the greatest source of emotional catharsis in tracks like “This Time Around” and “Let the Water.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXX61bNOCMA
She’s never stingy with the harmonies she applies to the beats here, and in turn, she’s able to make the most out of atmospheric componentry others would have either eliminated or let go to waste in the backdrop. Brown is utilizing every morsel of musical substance here to bear some of the weight that lyrics would typically be tasked with carrying, and while this fuels the mood behind the narrative in each song, it also makes the entire tracklist feel more like a live performance than something rehearsed and laid out in some faraway studio.
DISTRO KID: https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/briellebrown/the-well
I’ve listened to so many quality singer/songwriters in 2021 it’s been hard to keep track of who my favorites are — up until hearing The Well for the first time, that is. I cannot say that I’ve heard anyone quite like Brielle Brown in the past year, and though her disciplined approach to arranging and composing is indeed the primary element setting her apart from the majority of high-potential players making their way through the American underground at the moment, it isn’t the only reason I’d name her the most gifted of her peer group right now.
The Well opens up her heart and her storytelling abilities through means other artists simply don’t consider outside of making over-the-top concept pieces, and if this is just a sneak preview of her future, she’s destined to go quite far in this business.
Colin Jordan
