Suzannah

Baltimore-based singer-songwriter Suzannah surely has the pipies to have a vivacious musical career that crisscrosses Americana and pop like that of Yola, Suzannah has announced her solo debut album Is There Any Love In Your Heart which was produced by Chris Shaw (Bob Dylan, Wilco) with guest appearances from Jason Wilber (John Prine), Ron Stewart (Seldom Scene) and Mike Lowry (Future Islands).

Glide is premiering the song and video for the haunting “Losing Side of Town,” which echoes a bygone country aroma of Linda Rondstadt and Emmylou Harris. The nostalgic visuals in the music video accompany the song beautifully: we find our protagonist alone in a barren Southwest landscape, singing her woes to nobody but herself and the moon. Poignant, moving, and evocative of another time, Suzannah transports her listeners to a world of her own.

On the single, Suzannah shares: “When I first started writing songs seriously in my early 20s, my biggest singing influences were Ray Charles and Mick Jagger (and Aretha and Diana, but I tried to be realistic). I loved their delivery, how they could bring an element of hope to the sadness, a little bit of pop to the blues, and I was obsessed with songs like ‘Born to Lose,’ ‘I Got the Blues,’ etc. It became a goal of mine to write the perfect ‘losing’ song. I’ve written a lot of them over the years, but ‘Losing Side of Town’ is the losing song I would have wished I could have written when I was 20. While it was written much later (on a muggy summer night a few years ago when I had just watched Fat City—a losing movie—and I was thinking about those characters and their defeats and hopes and dreams), I still hold a place in my heart for this feeling that we’ve all felt at one time or another. The best losing songs contain that element of hope deep within and I like to think I achieved that here and that 20-year-old me would be pleased.” - Glide Magazine

Baltimore Americana artist Suzannah has released her debut album, Is There Any Love In Your Heart. We asked her the BIG questions . . .

"Is There Any Love In Your Heart is an album about forgiveness and redemption, grace and mercy," she says. "It's about being up against something bigger than oneself, a foe, a force trying to hold one back. It’s about having your name tarnished, your heart ripped out.

"It’s about being dragged through the mud. You look back. How do you respond? What can you do? It’s about having gotten too close to something you shouldn’t have seen, having been deep down in the darkness and coming out on the other side.

"You may not be fully healed, and you’re forever changed, but by the grace of God you escaped a worse fate. Have you forgiven? Can you show mercy when it wasn’t shown to you? Is there any love in your heart?"

Tell us three things about yourself . . .

I recently became a mom. I enjoy playing poker and I love a good conversation.

How would you describe your music?

Lyrically-driven singer songwriter jams played by a firecracker band.

Who are your musical inspirations?

Too many to name them all, but big ones have included Bob Dylan, Ray Charles, Waylon Jennings, Aretha Franklin. - RTE News

Baltimore-based singer-songwriter Suzannah re-examines the romanticized nature of the open highway on "Is There Any Love in Your Heart," the title track from her forthcoming album (out Nov. 10).

"This is the centerpiece and title track of the album. The crux of the hero's journey of forced introspection," Suzannah tells Wide Open Country. "On one hand the open highway should represent a sense of freedom like in most country songs, but here it represents quite the opposite, the monotonous blips of the yellow lines ticking by to remind the driver that the way he had been going wasn't necessarily the right way. All hope is not lost however. Sometimes it takes hitting the absolute bottom before you're ready to ask yourself the real question."

The introspective groover finds Suzannah tracing the hero's journey to self-discovery.

"I wanted to explore the downtrodden hero that feels like no matter what they do, they can't get it right," Suzannah says. "In the context of the album, this is the middle of the journey where they're starting to realize they're dealing with a rigged game and now that they understand the game, they know the right question to ask. In the first verse, they're up against the law; the second verse implies they're pleading in front of a judge of some sort; and the third verse implies they've been imprisoned and their pleading didn't matter. They've come to the realization that they've actually been doing it all wrong by looking to other people and the outside world. They've spent a long time at the mercy of others and realize now the only place to look is inside oneself (or to God)." - Wide Open Country

Baltimore-based singer-songwriter Suzannah creates music in the form of personal narratives which speak to our ongoing relationship with our memories, using them as conduits to alter our perspective and gain a deeper understanding of how our experiences shape us as individuals. Deftly maneuvering between old school twang and something approximating Cocteau Twins covering Patsy Cline, her sound is a gauzy melding of influences which speaks to the range of musical histories contained within.

She is set to release her debut album, Is There Any Love In Your Heart, on November 11, and it finds her digging into themes of redemption, forgiveness, and mercy — all things that can seem so difficult as outside forces feel like they are constantly trying to pin you down, to loosen your hold on your own self-worth. How do we reassess ourselves and our relationship to the world after experiencing trauma of all kinds? Do we give in to despair and frustration, or do we attempt to pull ourselves out of those shadows and find new purpose in the wake of so much emotional devastation? These are the questions she seeks to examine within the boundaries of the new record.

With new single, “Skeletons”, she crafts a dreamy twang through which she explores ways to hang on despite hardship, to find a reason to push forward an persevere — and ultimately, to discover the strength to take on the world. Her voice is as light as morning dew and as resilient as red clay. The guitars slide and shuffle about, recalling the work of bands like Uncle Tupelo and early Steve Earle, but Suzannah fully inhabits this gauzy alt-country aesthetic, letting it grow and bloom until it makes you forget about dull genre comparisons and forces you to reconsider it on its own terms. - Beats Per Minute

Suzannah Brings Meditative Songwriting To Is There Any Love In Your Heart

Baltimore-based singer/songwriter Suzannah has been songwriting for many years and has substantial experience as a live performer and is releasing her first studio album on November 10th, 2022, titled Is There Any Love In Your Heart. It represents selections from a number of years of songwriting and recording, but she also has many songs that have not yet made their way into the public sphere. The songs have a storytelling aspect in common, and a number of different character perspectives, that take you on a meditative journey into various emotional realities.

Songs like “Skeletons” and “Losing Side of Town” are thought-provoking, but handle potentially difficult experiences with a reflective tone based on Suzannah’s dream-like but guiding vocals and the gentle layers of instrumentation. Drawing from plenty of roots traditions, the songs also have aspects reminiscent of dream pop and the more contemplative side of psychedelic pop while remaining a unique creation. I spoke with Suzannah about her history as a songwriter and what made these songs her selection for her first publicly released album. - Americana Highways

Baltimore singer-songwriter Suzannah shares solo debut record, Is There Any Love In Your Heart, weaving a sonic tale on themes of forgiveness and redemption, grace and mercy. Having made three LPs that were never released, this latest record becomes her first full-length to grace our ears.

Speaking of the stunning record, she says, “I wanted it to be sonically pretty and warm with some depth to the lyrics. I experimented with different styles of poetry, from direct to more abstract, sparse to more lyrically dense, storytelling to introspective.”

Framed by an old country twang, Suzannah’s musical taste is a smooth combination of the country music stalwarts like Emmylou, Waylon, Dwight and Gram alongside her personal leaning towards an addictive hook and thoughtful song writing. She also loves the rhythm and rich cadence of hip-hop musicians though she doesn’t claim to lean into the sound.

In short, she explains her artistry as it stands now as “a phase in my writing where my initial inspiration is still there coupled with whatever craft I've picked up along the way,” with this latest body of work being the perfect amalgamation of all her classic influences and mainstream interests.

Thematically, an exploration of facing things bigger than yourself or the vulnerability of having being hurt on the journey of life and of drowning in darkness only to come out the other side, Is There Any Love In Your Heart has been crafted to be your solace, comfort and companion through every moment – whether life-changing or mundane.

Suzannah says, “I feel like this is a record that will find people when they need it to. When I think about the music that's resonated the most with me throughout my own life, it's always been music that has served as good background music. That is music that I've been able to put on and do my own thing to, whether that's dance, clean the house, drive around, share a good time with a friend, or think about my own hopes, wants and dreams.”

Perfectly crafting a sonic world built upon layered harmonies, this album is made to resonate with anyone listening, regardless of the varied and unique life experiences that we’re each made of, laying down the path for an eclectic yet unifying musical journey. - Earmilk

Baltimore-based singer songwriter Suzannah shows yet another side to her musical character with today’s premiere of her new single ‘Is There Any Love In Your Heart‘, the third to be taken from her debut album of the same title which will be released on November 10th. Previous singles ‘Losing Side of Town’ and ‘Skeletons’ have gained praise earning her comparisons to Linda Ronstadt and the Cocteau Twins. Neither comparison likely to be applied to the latest song which rips into a bluesy country groove of the type that you might associate with Waylon Jennings. I know, you expected Janis or something – but this is a true veer into the edge of Outlaw Country. I know, and we’re as surprised as you but Suzannah is not going to be pinned down into any narrow genre definition.

Suzannah told Americana UK about where the song came from: “Several years ago I had a bad bout of insomnia. Not wanting to wake up my partner with my tossing and turning, I’d creep out of our bed and go into the second bedroom where there’s a bookcase where we keep all of our religious, spiritual and metaphysical books. I spent a lot of late nights/early mornings in that room during that time. One night after I had been reading, I lay down in the pitch black and saw a long expanse of dark highway stretched out very vividly in my mind. I thought about someone who might be driving on that highway, how he got there, where he was going, how even an endless expanse of open road could represent the feeling of being stuck as much as the hall with the cold iron bars at the end of the song, ironically. A faint question at the back of the mind becomes more and more incessant and might leave one last chance for a way out… if it is answered correctly.” - Americana UK