Rosie Brown
Detail From A Dream
★★★★
STUCK. CD/DL
London singer/songwriter’s fourth LP mixes ghostly Americana and acoustic soul.
Rosie Brown’s voice is warm and beguiling, with lyrics that reflect an imaginative inner landscape. Her last album, Strange Recollection (2009), was expansive and ambitious, whereas this one, recorded with guitarist/ producer and long-term collaborator Bernd Rest, has a more pared-down sound that ebbs and flows from slow, drifting harmonies to country swing. Black Dog, for instance, is a slice of hallucinatory Americana, detailing the mental tussle of the black dog mood that she feeds at night and fights by day. This contrasts with the rockabillyinfused rhythm of Lucky The Moon, sung with the insouciance of a ’50s Les Paul and Mary Ford track, and a fluid version of Johnny Cash song Oh, Bury Me Not, embellished with lap steel guitar and trumpet. Brown’s world is inviting, deftly summoning musical ghosts – like the Aladdin Sane-style flourish of All Around The World – whilst being deeply personal at the same time.