Post by traveller on Apr 13, 2009 14:16:55 GMT -6
Amy Speace uses phrases like "it was kind of an exorcism" and "I spilled blood all over this project" to describe her sophomore album on Wildflower Records titled 'The Killer In Me' (out June 30th). The follow-up to her 2006 breakthrough 'Songs For Bright Street', 'Killer' finds the New York-based singer/songwriter forging into deeper, darker lyrical and musical terrain, borne largely out of the dissolution of her 10-year marriage.
Speace wrote the songs on 'Killer' during a period self-imposed isolation in a rural cabin in the Catskills- a cathartic experience that helped her cope with her marital separation.
The rural setting, Speace explains, "forced me to sit with a lot of silence, fear and confusion and make a kind of peace with them by writing songs to keep from going crazy. That's when the album started making sense to me and became a whole different thing. Something shifted when I realized what was going on in the world outside mirrored what was going on inside of me, and I wanted to write songs that bridged that divide."
The 12 songs on 'Killer' move through emotions from pain ("Blue Horizon"), codependency ("The Killer In Me"), remorse ("Would I Lie" "Dirty Little Secret"), regret ("I Met My Love"), to hope ("This Love").
Musically, Amy Speace embraces the lyric-focused emotions of folk music, but breaks the genre's mold with bellowing horns and organ and twangy electric guitars. Again, Speace is joined by longtime producer and lead guitarist James Mastro (of Bongos/Health and Happiness Show fame) and her band the Tearjerks (guitarist Rich Feridun, bassist Matt Lindsey and drummer Jagoda). English rock icon Ian Hunter is new to the crew lending vocals to two songs.
A New Jersey transplant, Speace originally had her sites set on becoming a playwright and actor after college, touring with the National Shakespeare Company and teaching in NYC. She taught herself to play guitar, started writing songs, and hit the road booking as many shows across the country as possible while raising money to record her self-released 2002 album 'Fable'.
A SXSW performance caught the eye of Judy Collins and in 2006 Collins' Wildflower Records released Speace's debut 'Songs For Bright Street'. The album grabbed the attention of industry tastemakers including WFUV's John Platt, while No Depression said, "Amy Speace has one of those fetching voices, the kind that taps you on the shoulder and motions seductively for you to follow it around corner after dark corner. You don't know where you're going to end up or how you'll ever find your way back, but that doesn't matter right now: you're enjoying the trip."
Speace wrote the songs on 'Killer' during a period self-imposed isolation in a rural cabin in the Catskills- a cathartic experience that helped her cope with her marital separation.
The rural setting, Speace explains, "forced me to sit with a lot of silence, fear and confusion and make a kind of peace with them by writing songs to keep from going crazy. That's when the album started making sense to me and became a whole different thing. Something shifted when I realized what was going on in the world outside mirrored what was going on inside of me, and I wanted to write songs that bridged that divide."
The 12 songs on 'Killer' move through emotions from pain ("Blue Horizon"), codependency ("The Killer In Me"), remorse ("Would I Lie" "Dirty Little Secret"), regret ("I Met My Love"), to hope ("This Love").
Musically, Amy Speace embraces the lyric-focused emotions of folk music, but breaks the genre's mold with bellowing horns and organ and twangy electric guitars. Again, Speace is joined by longtime producer and lead guitarist James Mastro (of Bongos/Health and Happiness Show fame) and her band the Tearjerks (guitarist Rich Feridun, bassist Matt Lindsey and drummer Jagoda). English rock icon Ian Hunter is new to the crew lending vocals to two songs.
A New Jersey transplant, Speace originally had her sites set on becoming a playwright and actor after college, touring with the National Shakespeare Company and teaching in NYC. She taught herself to play guitar, started writing songs, and hit the road booking as many shows across the country as possible while raising money to record her self-released 2002 album 'Fable'.
A SXSW performance caught the eye of Judy Collins and in 2006 Collins' Wildflower Records released Speace's debut 'Songs For Bright Street'. The album grabbed the attention of industry tastemakers including WFUV's John Platt, while No Depression said, "Amy Speace has one of those fetching voices, the kind that taps you on the shoulder and motions seductively for you to follow it around corner after dark corner. You don't know where you're going to end up or how you'll ever find your way back, but that doesn't matter right now: you're enjoying the trip."