Exploring life, love, and ambition by poetry in movement, singer/songwriter Madison Hughes’ debut album ‘All That I Am’ is a musical {photograph} of all that she is on this second.
‘All That I Am’ – Madison Hughes
You wouldn’t be incorrect if you first hear Madison Hughes to assume you’re listening to Lee Ann Womack.
Their vocals sensibilities are hand in glove. Understated, mild, restrained but you possibly can hear an anger simmering under the floor. Like Womack earlier than her, it’s what Hughes’ doesn’t say that sticks to you. There’s a literary component to Hughes’ songwriting. Her songs may simply be brief tales. Every character in every tune has their very own journey, which I prefer to assume continues lengthy after the observe fades out.
Hughes doesn’t sound like a brand new artist. Her music and voice feels prefer it’s been dwelling in your audio system for a very long time. It feels settled, worn in, like a great e-book you haven’t learn for years however you bear in mind the texture of the pages.
Her debut album, All That I Am (launched April 11) is co-produced by Hughes, Lera Lynn (True Detective, Roseanne Money, Misty Boyce) and Todd Lombardo (Kacey Musgraves, Publish Malone, Ella Langley).
You might know Hughes from The Voice and performing rock & roll hits to viral covers of modern-day nation singles. Raised in Jacksonville, Florida, Hughes grew up attending her mom’s native music pageant, the place she performed a few of her first reveals as an adolescent. On the invoice have been acts like Shovels & Rope, Drew Holcomb, and Lera Lynn. Hughes truly reconnected with Lynn in Nashville, who agreed to co-produce Hughes’ full-length debut album. Hughes later studied digital movie manufacturing in faculty earlier than shifting to Nashville in her twenties.
“I bought my begin in music in a really DIY manner – making songs on my pc and self-producing in my very own little world,” Hughes tells Atwood Journal. “This was additionally the primary time I labored with producers, and I beloved the collaborative expertise—they actually introduced out the perfect in me.”
Hughes attracts on southern Gothic Nation, which reminds one in every of Lindi Ortega and Lynn herself. The album sits firmly within the Americana custom, however don’t let that deceive you into considering the file is style particular. All That I Am may be very a lot an ever evolving file as you return and preserve hitting play. The thread that runs by the ten tracks is a push and pull. It’s not at all times stress or a ache; it’s additionally a dance between two folks or two emotions.
All That I Am opens with the title observe, co-written with Hughes, Lynn and Lombardo. It begins as a haunting Appalachian melody, accompanied by Hughes’ understated vocals. The tune then switches up within the refrain and turns into a hovering and stomping pop tune. The tune is a push and pull, not solely within the storytelling, but in addition within the music itself.
He lives for the night time
And I’m the solar
I wanna shine my love gentle on him
However he’s at all times on the run
Oh you recognize there’s something about
the way in which that he turns away makes my fireplace burn
All that I’m gonna take all that I bought to stroll away
From the again of his lovely head
His hair waving goodbye makes me keep
– “All That I Am,” Madison Hughes
“All That I Am” additionally occurs to be Hughes’ favorite from the album.
“It’s my favourite tune on the file,” She shares. “‘All That I Am’ is a real story about how my anxious attachment fashion affected my relationships – the push and pull of wanting one thing actual however struggling to stroll away from somebody emotionally unavailable.”
“No person Is aware of Your Love” is a duet between Hughes and Brent Cobb. It’s a meandering, dreamy love tune. Hughes and Cobb’s voices weave out and in of one another, when one goes in a single route, the opposite isn’t far behind it, pulling it in shut after which pushing it away. Their voices dance round one another.
At any time when I lose sight of you
It doesn’t matter what the miles
I’ll at all times hear the music
that my thoughts makes if you smile
Trigger you might be my sunshine, my purple wine,
My midnight storm
And what I’m livin for
Duets are straightforward and exhausting all of sudden. Simple, as a result of anybody can sing collectively, even when they’re miles aside expertise could make them appear as if their in the identical vocal sales space. Laborious, as a result of not all duets are equal. Not all duets do what Hughes and Cobb do. Listening to the phrases and their voices bleeding collectively, you consider the tune, you consider the sensation, you consider the characters, one thing that’s uncommon to perform.
“This album felt like my very own model of grad faculty, a deep dive into creating not simply songs, however an entire world that felt cohesive,” says Hughes. “Ten tracks may look like a breeze, however crafting one thing that actually looks like one physique of labor took a whole lot of work.”
Within the penultimate tracks “So Shut To Ceaselessly,” Hughes is left grappling with the top of a relationship and making an attempt to know how, peeling again every reminiscence to try to make it make sense.
You have been the sand and I used to be the ocean washing the shore
So I can’t perceive how we can’t be anymore
A easy strummed acoustic guitar begins “Ready On You.” Hughes vocals delicate and understated sings of the particular person she is and the particular person she is turning into, “My viewpoint is fading, Gettin smaller in mirror, The additional that I’m going, I’m chasing one thing I can hear it, What it appears like I’ll by no means know.” The tune then opens up, with the refrain rolling out like a panorama unfolding in entrance of you.
Wild is the wanderer
Wandering on her personal
I don’t wish to be ready round
Ready for the appropriate phrases
For the appropriate sound
Possibly it’s inexperienced i left you blue
However I can’t preserve ready ready on you
These ultimate tracks are in regards to the finish. The top of a love, the breaking of a promise, or the top of a manner of being? Hughes’ writing is evident in some respects however she leaves sufficient of the main points as much as your creativeness.
She explains, “This course of (of creating the file) all started proper after The Voice, in January 2023, and I had little or no songwriting expertise. I wrote with as many individuals as I may and the themes all naturally wove collectively – primarily reflecting my courting life on the time. I grew up listening and watching Lera Lynn’s journey since I used to be 14, so that is the good full circle second for me to have her produce and write songs for this file together with her husband Todd (Lombardo).”
All That I Am closes with “Gypsy Wings,” an ode to Hughes herself. The tune is about embracing herself as a artistic. Within the opening verse, Hughes tells us, “If you happen to bought a hearth that’s burning, This city will solely kill that flame, Hearken to the freeway callin’, when you hear it name your identify,” phrases of knowledge maybe Hughes needs she had been given, or her personal knowledge she nonetheless leans on. The difficulty with being a artistic is self-doubt walks its muddy footprints throughout you after everybody else has taken a bit out of you.
Roll like a river
Journey on the wind
Chase that taking pictures star up to now
That you simply’ll by no means come again once more
Set your sights on the heavens
And sing the tune you sing
Say goodbye, discover the sky
Unfold these gypsy wings
Let em fly, fly away
Hughes admitted to having little or no songwriting expertise, however as was mentioned originally, Madison Hughes doesn’t sound like a brand new artist; she sounds established, assured, as if her music has been sitting in your vinyl shelf for years.
This file is a musical {photograph} of all that Madison Hughes is on this second.
“It’s necessary to learn to belief your self, and that’s the place this album got here from,” she smiles. “It got here from me. I’m so glad I didn’t attempt to be like another person, as a result of that wouldn’t be trustworthy. I can solely be all that I’m.”
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© Libby Danforth
All That I Am
an album by Madison Hughes