Skip to main content

Johanna Samuels Releases Debut Album as Free Download

By

Sounds Like: You visited an unpublicized traveling carnival only to hear an exquisite songbird accompanied by the strongman on calliope.


RIYL: The Softies, El Perro Del Mar, Jolie Holland, Serge Gainsbourg, The Organ


Response: Maybe it's the fog's slow ride through the Pacific Northwest that has me hankering for haunting melodies. Or maybe it's just winter in general. Or maybe it's a little bit of both--fitting since that's the name of Johanna Samuels's debut release. Not that the soft melodies of A Little Bit of Both are in any way dependent on the weather. Her tremolo vocals and "ooh la las" would linger in any season, and the musical stylings are just as suited to June evenings as January mornings.


There hasn't been much buzz about her yet, but Stelios Phili at Popsense has nothing but nice things to say about Samuels:

At the center of A Little of Bit of Both is the classic theme of love, but Johanna's take on it is refreshingly candid. "Prisoner's of the Parking Lot" is the most nostalgic track on the EP, recalling the bittersweet memories of a past love - "Back in high school/When the city held me down/We used to laugh, you'd spin me/like I was the only the only girl who wore your crown."

Download A Little of Both for free from PopSense.com

Comments

Anonymous said…
excellent find!! thank you :)
19 January, 2009
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Lucero Video for "Darken My Door"

By
Darken My Door from Lucero on Vimeo . It's good to see that a serious band doesn't have to take itself seriously. Even better when a band's fans don't take them too seriously. "Darken My Door" off of Lucero's latest album, 1372 Overton Park , is a song about losing stuff--girlfriend, money, dignity. In fact, a lot of Lucero's songs are like that, but I'm not getting into that now. I'm talking about the video, which has so much to love. Obviously, I love the fact director Alex Mecum has used a puppet as the protagonist. But it's what the puppet does that makes this video so much fun. Puppet eating chili dogs, puppet drinking whiskey, puppet giving blow jobs . . . Hell, there's even puppet vomit! It's ridiculous, yes, but also tragic. By the end of the video, if you don't feel a little sorry for the scruffy faced whore puppet, then you have no soul. Here's a little more about the videos for Lucero's new album: To promot...
Post a Comment
Read more

Okkervil River, Wellington, New Zealand :: Live Music Review

By
There are energetic drummers, and then there is Travis Nelson. Truly, he is 'Animal.' Okkervil River albums have so much personality, the songs themselves become characters: players, people in the guise of animals or gods (and who can tell the difference sometimes?). And like watching a melodrama, we are witness to emotions that heave and plummet with frightening force. The songs can be drunken youth: the rotund boots on their feet knocking wildly on every surface. Or they can be villainous and smart, full of smiles and wishing-you-well up to the second they thrust the dagger into your belly. Pitched, lust-crazed, calculated: that is one half of an Okkervil album. The other emotion is equally intense in its thick, slow agony: the eternity it takes to remove the knife, knowing you have it all to do over. And so it goes: soaring, drunk, angry, knife, stab, agony, pull-it-out-and-let's-do-it-again. At the San Fransisco Bathhouse in Wellington, New Zealand, on a crisp early a...
2 comments
Read more

Best Music of 2008 [Last.FM gobbles our scrobbles]

By
Internet radio / social network / music discover tool Last.FM has released its Best of 2008 list. There are going to be dozens of "best" lists coming out in the next few weeks, but this one should command your attention. The list is not based on radio play, and it is not based on best selling albums. It is based on the number of times we (that's the royal "we" in all it's regal garb) have played tracks from our iTunes, iPods, Songbirds, or any other player that allows scrobbling. It is based on what we wanted to hear. We pressed play. We made the playlists. The only fault I can find lies in the Top 10 Tracks, which basically MGMT and Colplay. But that's what you get with raw data. To me, the Artists list is the most compelling. You will find no Kanye West on this list; no Britney and no Janet. You will only find the artists played incessantly and obsessively.
3 comments
Read more