Priscilla Renea – Hello My Apple [EP]
Capitol Records (3/31/09)
Pop
The story goes like this: Navy kid travels around the country from school to school, usually joins the choir and theatre groups, develops her own identity, gets a guitar for Christmas one year and ends up writing fantastic, original songs, all before her 18th birthday.
After writing a collection of soulful and interesting tunes, Priscilla Renea started self-promoting on YouTube, where her songs gained over 1.6 million views and over 30,000 channel subscribers. Priscilla then joined the Atlanta-based production company Power Entertainment, where she honed her skills and worked with various collaborators to produce the Hello My Apple EP.
While her full-length, debut album, Jukebox, is scheduled for release later this year, the opening title track of this EP, “Hello My Apple”, is showcased by a straight-ahead, jangly acoustic guitar as Priscilla seems to “story-tell” the lyrics over the music. The tone is delightfully happy and uplifting without sounding forced or contrived. “I Fell In Love” follows with a very cool rhythm section and groove. It also features authentic moments of joy and effortless cloud-dancing. The final song, “Cry”, lives up to its name, as the backing vocals are intense and emotional.
I’ll be honest, the styles of music that shine through the works of Priscilla Renea aren’t what I’d normally find myself listening to. Sometimes there is a moment or two where you can sense the youth in the recordings, but the amount of maturity that exudes from them is far exceeding. The passion of her voice mixed with the quality of songwriting is the honest combination that made me give her debut a triple listen.
