I enjoy many genres of music, but as it gets harder to keep track of all the sub-genres that are popping up nowadays, I find it easier to simply divide music into two categories: "good music" and "bad music." Some people enjoy only one or two types of music, but I enjoy all kinds, as long as it fits into the "good music" category, that is. In addition, as musicians, my band mates and I enjoy playing many different styles of music.
That's why I was intrigued when I came across Laura Pursell's Somewhere In This Room. The album is a collaboration between singer and lyricist Laura Pursell and composer Andrew Bonime, and is a unique project for two reasons. The first is that it consists of songs in many different musical styles; there's jazz, rock, blues, bossa nova, gospel, and even a children's song. As a music lover, I admire Pursell and Bonime for making no distinctions among different music styles for this album other than the "good music"/"bad music" distinction.
The second reason it's unique is that the album isn't so much "a collection of songs" as it is "a book made up of songs." You have to listen to it from beginning to end. It even has an overture and a finale arranged by famous composer, arranger, and pianist, William Pursell, who is also Laura's father. Every single song has a story to tell, and while I was listening to the album I had the curious feeling that I was reading rather than listening to it. It was as if I were reading a book of short stories, and the songs were the chapters of the book, and the book was Laura Pursell's diary.
Set to Bonime's music, Pursell's lyrics are based on her experiences and her accounts of those experiences in her diaries. From falling in love, in the rock number "It Might As Well Be Magic," to heartbreak in the dark and somber "Not Much To Lose," and running away from love in the bittersweet ballad "Skywriting Neon Lights," and from the death of a close friend, in "My Heart Knows You Were Here," to her experiences as a child trying so desperately to fit in, in "A Maple Tree," Pursell tells her stories in her meaningful lyrics. My favorite tracks are the title track, "Somewhere in This Room," and "When You Come Down," which both tell very interesting stories.
Article comments
1 - Are you kidding?
Probably one of the poorest sounding collections of songs (music) I've ever heard.
The video for "Found" on Laura's own webpage is what I term "Estranged Enya meets the 'A-team' theme song: a lesson from the 80's in videography."
I don't know who talked Laura into that freakish video, but Laura's far better than that.
Indeed, let's hope that Laura doesn's "waste that wonderful voice of hers."