duggup

Today’s artist will strike some of my friends as an odd one… it’s no surprise that I am not what you would call a “fan” of country. Indeed the sound of a steel guitar usually (but not always sends me running. And then there is Sara Storer, the latest in a select group of people who are obviously here to remind me that
A: Generalisations are a bad thing and
B: Yes this really does apply to country music as well.

The funny thing is I didn’t realise she was a country artist at first. I just heard “Land Cries Out” and thought, “Wow.. cool song”. Mainly because it was covering the same topic that my friend Ian is covering in some of his songs (we chatted about him some months back). I really thought she was a contemporary folk act.

Here is a long quote from the MySpace site…

Land Cries Out, the lead single from her forthcoming album Silver Skies, carries on a tradition of writing intelligent and uniquely Australian songs from the rural heartland. In conjunction with co-producer Matt Fell and The Waifs’ Josh Cunningham, Sara has embraced some refreshing new

Electric guitars and drums add a powerful sense of foreboding to Sara’s tale of an imagined conversation between a farmer and the land he is being forced to leave. This is a unique perspective on an all too common situation in Australia, sprung from a conversation Sara had with her mother – herself a farmer’s wife - at her kitchen table.

The women were bemoaning the effects on all parties when families are forced to leave properties that have been theirs for generations. “Who will come and will they treat it with the love and respect the previous family did?” Sara asks. “There’s a connection. When he looks after his land, the land returns the love by producing good things. I wanted the song to talk about the land having a soul. I wanted to sing it from the point of view of the land, to be able to call “don’t give up”.

Sorry for the long quote but to find out what the fuss is about head over to http://www.myspace.com/sarastorermusic and have a listen. It really is good stuff, and I am truly astounded that she has been signed by a major label. They usually avoid good stuff like the plague (oops was that my outside voice?).

Highly Recommended (and I was kidding about the slide guitars)