Emily Brown is a songwriter and poet from California. Her third album, Bee Eater, which was released recently after a wildly successful Kickstarter campaign, is something of a landmark in her musical career. It’s the album she’s wanted to make for a long time, big and ambitious in every sense. As the bio describes it as “deeply personal and universal, packed with detailed imagery and blunt honesty […] confessional and conversational […] driven by its rich poetic influence and lyrical melodies.”
The album opens with ‘That’s Not Me’, all wavering strings and trickling piano and a bright and positive atmosphere, somewhere at the crossroads between Illinois Era Sufjan and Regina Spektor. Although initial impressions can be deceiving, and the lyrics hint at the kind of honest sentiment that’s abound on Bee Eater. It finds the narrator warning a loved one, a reminder of a mercurial restlessness and personal freedom that isn’t content to be locked into any one place or situation for too long.
The sentiment could be said to define Bee Eater, right down the the avian artwork, a kind of coiled energy within, always looking to soar free. ‘Sometimes’ feel dark and rich, electric guitar rolling across the background like rumbles of distant thunder, the whole thing whipping up into a little whirlwind of energy, Brown’s voice carried along in wordless yelps. The lyrics this time deal with a difficult relationship, of distances both real and psychological, and the difficulties of communication that sometimes arise even between loved ones.
Every answer’s clothed in layers of disguise
Oh it scares me that I cannot see your eyes
I am living in a house with all the blinds raised
Watching you look through the windows from outside
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The intimate and emotionally intense writing doesn’t stop there, and neither do the aspirations of freedom. ‘Giving Up’ is a break-up song that cuts to the bone, the narrator leaving their partner to follow their own path. “I don’t mean to say that the whole time I’ve been lying,” Brown sings, “I’m only implying I wish I was free.” The vulnerable piano ballad ‘Beautiful Baby’ utilises another facet of the bird imagery, speaking of the vulnerability felt in the aftermath of a relationship.
In comparison, ‘Unseen Girl’ sounds positively upbeat, despite its subject matter of a loved one pining for someone else. It’s a richly imagined folk rock song, intricately crafted and infectious, not unlike Haley Henderickx’s great album from earlier this year. ‘Take Me Up Slowly’ strips things right back, soft guitar and slowly pounded drums supporting Emily Brown’s expressive vocals, before the 60s folk pop of ‘Who Can Say’, with an earnest delivery and steady rise of which Petula Clark and Mama Cass Elliot would be proud.
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All that’s left then is the aching ballad of ‘Stay Lovin’, a track which serves as a setting straight of all that came before, all previous hurt and pain faded into a wistful warmth. The idea is pertinent for Bee Eater and Emily Brown’s style more generally—finding fondness within even the most fractured of situations, and beauty within the natural processes of change.
Bee Eater is out now on a variety of formats including CD and vinyl and you can buy it from the Emily Brown Bandcamp page.
