Claire Holley: Hush

Breezy and down home sounds emerge from Hush, Claire Holley’s latest release on her own label, Olivia’s Attic Music. From the first note of “Visit Me”, the record exudes soft country emotions. The soaring lap steel (Greg Leisz) brings to mind sparkling waves and hovering seagulls as Holley coos, “The last you wrote the sailing was pretty good / But when the storms return come visit me.” Holley’s youthful and bright vocals ache with longing against her own saccharine harmonies. The tension and release from conflicting and dissonant note combinations results as the song rolls on.

Holley penned all but two songs on the album, the remainder being drawn from the words of W.B. Yeats’ poem “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” (incidentally and unrelated, also the inspiration for a song from the cranberries’ No Need to Argue) and “Stars Fell on Alabama”, the jazz standard composed by Frank Perkins and Mitchell Parrish.