tomorrow (10.12) strong>cheyenne marie mize’s wonderful independent release “before lately,” after being picked up by a label, will be rereleased, with new cover art and a couple of extra tracks. to celebrate and support this rerelease she will be performing an in-store @ ear x-tacy (@ 7:00PM). this (her independent release of “born lately”) was one of my top 10 picks of the first half of the year.
cheyenne will also be playing a full show saturday evening, october 16th, at the beautiful christ evangelical church in the highlands.
here is a little info on cheyenne and “born lately“:
Cheyenne Marie Mize doesn’t need gimmickry, wild instrumentation — or for that matter, antecedents. Who needs all that when the music you make is exceptionally your own? Her upcoming release, “Before Lately”, is a mighty record, sometimes sounding like the country-tinged Americana of Eleni Mandell, the piano balladry of Carole King, with a dash of Samantha Crain and Shelby Lynne. The strength of Mize’s music is how she coats the bitter with a sugary topping. Her voice is the angelic part, but the devil is in the other details: she has an eclectic ear for melody, fanciful musical transitions, dreamy tones and earthy lyricism. The writing is severely honest, cutting straight to the chase like a shot of whiskey. Each song is titled with one word. No disguises here. “Before Lately” is a debut made with a veteran’s acumen.
The heartbreak opener, “Best”, sounds like Mandell on “Snakebite”, swaying with a countrified-twang guitar and dark, deep, bluesy repeated refrains, “I tried my hardest to be what you wanted / But now, we both see, it was all for the best / It was all for the best / I left and you thought I would be brokenhearted / I didn’t expect you to ever forgive me.” Unexpectedly, Mize shift gears with the second track, “Waiting”, a song that feels like some ‘Alice In Wonderland’ lullaby, with chimes, crying guitar and a drowsy sway. “Rest” is a shady sundown on the front-porch — a song about seeking repose in the warm glow of the person you love. It’s a credit to Mize’s talent that she can sing so forthright about love without sounding cliché. “Rest” is reminiscent of those lovely ballads written by musicians Julie and Buddy Miller. It’s a golden outpouring. Songwriting at its highest peak, rising through sheer simplicity of expression. There’s such a purity to every nuance.
Just as good, if not better, is the graceful “Lull”. A piano drips. Short phrases, drawn out notes. Like Erik Satie’s “Gymnopedies”. A banjo, sparse and crooked, tries its best to find comfort. Mize’s voice joins this gossamer pairing, stretching itself across them with a gentle morning ease, “Holding fast to you / In the late summer time / The love / Of warmth / Of skin / And of breathing / Rising / Falling / If only your love could cycle this / Slowly / This / Slowly / I / Slowly I wake and realize / That I am holding fast to you.” Typing the verse out doesn’t come close to doing justice to her phrasing and annunciation. (Or the fact that the lyrics circle back to the original line, just like the singer wishing for a ‘cycling’ or rebirth of love.) Mize sings the verses with subtle stumbles, and butterfly flutters, breaking apart words like a slow unraveling of both love and lyric. The last vibration of the piano hammer hitting the string is a reverberation of pure noblesse. It’s the song of nymphs and lotus-eaters falling into narcotic summer slumbers filled with scents of plum and melon.
“Kind” is built around a repeating double-tracked chorus, with bossa-nova styled guitar. “Not” feels like the sister-song to “Best”, another song centered around a crumbling relationship. It’s a heart-searing torch ballad, ala Fiona Apple. Where some of the lyrics many seem soft, the earnestness of Mize’s voice, mixed with sad strings, lifts the track with its sincerity. It’s hard not to feel the heartache, and the overwhelming nature of love having slipped away. “Path” plays like a heatwave in search of a cool patch of grass to lay down in. Wind chimes and a distant rattle are faintly heard in the background, as a running western guitar line plays underneath vocals sung like a mantra. A steel guitar carries “Friend” down an Appalachian pathway, dusty and graveled, in search of shelter from the oncoming stormy weather. A standout track, “With(out)”, is a song about the inner struggles of love, wanting to give yourself away completely, and yet knowing it may mean giving more than you want to give. It will be interesting to see where Mize goes after this. This album hangs on the edge of Americana, country, folk, jazz, blues, and piano pop. One gets the feeling Mize can do anything she wants. It’s only a matter of what she chooses to do next.
Note: Mize introduced herself musically on the 10-inch release “Among the Gold” – a collection of late 19th century American parlor music handpicked by her and Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy. “Before Lately” will be out October 12th, 2010 via sonaBLAST! Records. (Lyrics in this review are not official.) — David D. Robbins Jr.
what we need is music 