Rising Indie-Country-Americana singer-songwriter Courtney Marie Andrews has announced her critically acclaimed album ‘Honest Life’ released last week on Loose has topped the UK Americana charts. She also has sold out her headline dates around UK including The Social in London on March 6th, demonstrating she is fast becoming one of the most talked about artists in recent years in the UK. She also today announced she will be coming back to the UK for a performance at Bush Hall Shepherds Bush on 4 September.
Courtney’s album ‘Honest Life’, released late last year in the US and given it’s European release last week, has already caught the attention of Rolling Stone, NPR, Paste and Stereogum in the US, making it’s way onto many Best Of The Year lists. Despite playing catch up, Courtney has already captured the attention of UK’s media and music scene. She has landed feature after feature and a plethora of reviews in publications including The Daily Telegraph, The Sunday Times, The Independent, Guardian, Evening Standard, Q, Mojo, Line Of Best Fit, Clash, Gold Flake Paint, alongside BBC 6 Music lending early support – ensuring Courtney is set to become one of the success stories of 2017 here in the UK.
Respected music writers such as Laura Barton, who included Courtney in her Guardian feature celebrating female troubadours today and Neil McCormick have championed Courtney in the UK press. Neil in his lead review for the Daily Telegraph stated Honest Life is an,
“Absolutely perfect little gem of an album… every song here sparkles… the poetic economy of her lyrics is right up there with such masters of the country vignette as Guy Clark and John Prine… a truly substantial talent”. Line of Best Fit’s Jof Owen is equally as impressed stating, “It might only be January but it feels like Honest Life has already secured a spot in a lot of end of the year lists.”
Courtney’s music has already drawn diverse comparisons to artists from Emmylou Harris to PJ Harvey. Spanning genres through indie, Folk, Country and Alt-Rock, introspective and personal, her music and voice are both unique and classic. Channeling Nashville and Laurel Canyon, free of pastiche – Courtney is a musical gem – leading the charge of a new wave of female troubadours. Courtney has been on the road since she was 16 years old, when she left home in Arizona for her first tour. She travelled up and down the West Coast, busking and playing any bars or cafés that would have her. Soon after she took a Greyhound bus four nights straight from Phoenix to New York to do the same on the East Coast. For a decade or so since Courtney’s been a session and backup singer and guitarist for nearly 40 artists – from Jimmy Eat World to Damien Jurado – but she never stopped writing her own material.
With plans to settle down for a bit and focus on her own songs, Courtney moved to Seattle in 2011 and recorded her last full-length record On My Page. However, the record had hardly been released before she was on the road again performing other artists’ songs, eventually leading her overseas to play guitar and sing with Belgian star Milow. It was during this time that Courtney also wrote many of the songs on Honest Life. She found herself realising the impact of growing up on the road and this constant reconciling between her own and others’ art and identity. Courtney takes it from there:
“While in Belgium for four months I was going through a major heartbreak. I started growing homesick for America and the comfort of family and friends. That’s where I wrote the first songs for Honest Life. It was a giant hurdle in my life, my first true growing pains as a woman. That’s why I feel this record is a coming of age album. A common thread that runs through the songs is a great desire to fit somewhere, when nowhere fits – and wanting to get back home to the people I know and love. Once I got back to the USA I started to work at a small town bar. At the bar I felt I could truly empathize with the stories and lives of the people there. I wrote the other half of the songs about coming home and feeling a sense of belonging again. A lot of the stories at that bar definitely ran parallel with my own, even though our lives were so different. I was the “musician girl”. They were farmers, construction workers, plumbers, waitresses, and cashiers. But, no matter how different, I felt we were all trying to live our most honest life.”
True to her own vision, Andrews produced the resulting album herself and recorded it at Litho Studios in Seattle with recording engineer Floyd Reitsma, whose recent credits include Noah Gundersen and Pearl Jam.
Honest Life will be released 20 January 2017 on 180g turquoise vinyl, CD & download, via Loose. Courtney Marie Andrews will tour the UK in Feb and March, with headline dates as well as supporting The Handsome Family on their UK tour.
For more information please visit: http://www.
Dates below:
21 Feb – NORWICH, Arts Centre*
22 Feb – MANCHESTER, RNCM*
23 Feb – GLASGOW, St Luke’s*
24 Feb – EDINBURGH, The Caves*
25 Feb – GATESHEAD, Sage 2*
26 Feb – DURHAM, Old Cinema Launderette (3pm)
27 Feb – LEEDS, Brudenell*
28 Feb – CARDIFF, Clwb Ifor Bach
1 Mar – COVENTRY, The Tin
2 Mar – LONDON, Union Chapel* – SOLD OUT
3 Mar – BRIGHTON, Concorde 2*
4 Mar – GUILDFORD, The Keep
6 Mar – LONDON, The Social
8 Mar – COLOGNE, Theater der Wohngemeinschaft
9 Mar – ARNHEM, Luxor Live
10 Mar – MIDDELBURG, De Spot
11 Mar – MOERBEKE, House Show
12 Mar – BRUSSELS, AB Huis 23 – SOLD OUT
14 Mar – UTRECHT, Molen De Ster
15 Mar – TRONDHEIM, Moskus
16 Mar – OSLO, Buckley’s
17 Mar – MALMÖ, Folk A Rock
18 Mar – GOTHENBURG, Pustervik
