Anna’s Rose’s Fantastic Debut

Bruce Von Stiers

Anna Rose is a singer / songwriter. Her music is something of a collage of folk, pop and blues. She’s played gigs at venues like the Bitter End and the Living Room in New York and Hotel Café in L.A.

She comes from a hearty artist family. Her mother is a former professional ballet dancer. Her father is top tier composer and musician Alan Menken. You might know his work from Disney films like Aladdin and Hercules and for songs in other films like Rocky V and Life With Mikey.

Anna Rose now has a complete album out that. The album is called Nomad. The album has twelve songs and a playing time of forty-five minutes. It was released on the White Pony Records label.

Anna Rose co-produced the album with Billy Sullivan. His credits include playing with Peter Frampton, a who’s who of updated classic rock bands and even 11 appearances on the Jerry Lewis telethon. He is also kind of a mentor to Anna. The executive producer for the album is Bruce Botnick, who is legendary for his work with the Doors.

Adam Stoler is on guitar. Not only does he play in Anna’s band, he has played with jazz great Keiko Matsui. Tyler McDiarmid is also on guitar. Besides playing on some jazz albums, he is co-founder of Geoff And Tyler Recording, an onsite live recording and production company. On bass is Jamie Bishop. Along with playing for Anna, Jamie played with the Prigs and Francis Dunnery. Jordan Perlson is the drummer on the album. He’s played with bands like the Joshua Davis Group. Arlen Roth plays guitar on the album as well. Besides a ten year stint as a columnist for Guitar Player magazine, Arlen has played with Paul Simon, John Prine and Bob Dylan. And last, but far from least is Leon Pendarvis playing piano, synths and organ. Besides having the longest stay as a musician / musical director for Saturday Night Live, Leon has performed and recorded with some of the world’s top artists such as Paul Simon, Aretha Franklin and Eric Clapton.

As for Anna herself, she plays the guitar and does the vocals on the album. She also wrote all of the songs.

Sweet vocals and a moderate alt folk sound is what you will hear in the first song, In The Morning View.

Whispers has a light toe tapping beat and somewhat whispery vocals. Besides good vocals there is some really nice guitar work.

Picture is a very cool ballad. It has a little darker sound with a slight edge. There is a too tough guitar bridge in the song.

Things move back into a lighter view with the song The Four Corners. It has a moderate beat and fluid vocals. Once again there is some very good guitar backing Anna Rose’s great vocals.

I’ll Be Gone has a kind of bluesy sound. This one could fit right into the playlist on blues radio.

Dare is a song with a higher vocal range. It’s a kind of achy ballad where Anna Rose put a superb guitar bridge ala Clapton into the song. I don’t know what it is about Anna Rose and her guitar bridges, but they flat out kick it.

Overtone is such an aching ballad that it makes you want to just hug her and tell it’s going to be all right.

A killer, damning ballad is Walk Away.

All I Have To Say has great organ in it. The vocals are wonderful and the music is great. Do you get the feeling that I really like this album?

Gillian has a softer sound with a touch of country styled guitar.

Wilshire Blvd. is yet another great song. Yes, I know I’m overusing “great” but lesser terms don’t quite describe the essence of this album.

The last song is You Got It For Free. It begins with some nice acoustic guitar. It is a smooth yet slightly aching tone.

On this album Anna Rose shows that she has immense talent. Being paired with some top musicians and producers also proves her musical savvy. It shouldn’t be long before people will be saying her name with the same reverence as Sheryl Crow and Jewel.

Nomad is available on iTunes, at amazon.com and other online retailers.

You can hear five songs from Nomad on Anna Rose’s official web site. The site is http://www.annarosemusic.com/ Her MySpace Music site is http://www.myspace.com/annarosemusic. And for the Facebook faithful, the Anna Rose Facebook page can be found at http://www.facebook.com/annarosemusic?v=info#!

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© 2010 Bruce E. Von Stiers