(Music Lab Records, digital)
Burlington singer-songwriter Samantha Mae wrote her first song when she was 12, just after the death of her mother. She sat at a piano she didn’t know how to play and let her raw emotion pour out, which she describes in the bio on her website as her “first experience with the healing power of songwriting.”
Mae nurtured her early proclivity for music by performing in vocal groups and choirs throughout high school and college, but she never tried making her own music or performing outside of school. She wouldn’t write again until her wedding, when she set her vows to music. According to her bio, that experience woke something in Mae, and she decided to finally pursue being a songwriter.
The result of that epiphany is Mae’s debut LP, Reverie. You might expect a lo-fi bedroom recording from a first-time artist, especially one who has a day job and family and is completely unknown on the local scene. But the album is both expertly produced and beautifully arranged.
That’s partly a reflection of Mae’s songwriting skill and the strength of her vocal prowess. She possesses a warm, intimate style of singing, somewhere between a pop crooner such as Lana Del Rey and an indie rocker like Neko Case. From the easygoing pop of “My My Baby Goodbye” to the alt-rock-influenced “Mosaic,” Mae’s songs lack any trace of amateurism. She can effortlessly move into country terrain, as on “She’ll Know,” or go full balladeer with “Porch Light,” the song she wrote for her wedding. “You love me in spite of my flaws / you faced my demons and you rose above / so thank you for giving me a life worth telling, a story of under that porch light,” she sings, her voice full of warmth amid subtle melodic shifts.
The other secret to the album’s slick, professional sound is VT Music Lab, a relatively new studio in Essex Junction founded by Dwight + Nicole drummer Ezra Oklan and Cooked bassist Drew Holland. Oklan assembled a top-notch session band consisting of himself on drums, Leon Campos on keys, and Dan Bishop and Nashville musician Rob Calder on bass — an impressive backing band for a debutant. Along with engineer Calvin Winzler-Lane and Breathwork guitarist Xander Naylor (see above review), a Lab employee whose six-string wizardry is all over the album, the studio puts its best foot forward on Mae’s LP.
Reverie is the first album to drop on the studio’s nascent label, Music Lab Records. According to Oklan, the label is currently only releasing music recorded at the Lab, but he and Holland hope to expand its operations.
For a first offering both from the label and the artist, Reverie is a home run. Mae displays range in her songwriting; she can go supersweet on the album’s more romantic numbers just as expertly as she channels rage and remorse on the darker tracks. Raw feeling powers her music, making for an impressive debut.
Reverie is available on major streaming services.