There is an empowerment that comes with writing your own songs, that few things can match, in my experience. To realize that you can be truly honest and reach souls in a similar position as yours, to realize that you can be creative and be something of a master of your own fate in a compelling, thought provoking, feeling-inducing manner. Keely Burn starts her album, “Not Afraid,” which is a good place to start. “It’s a learning process / to trust yourself in your own skin,” she sings over body moving shaker and golden guitars to open the album, “and I’m still making progress / where constructs end and I begin.” “What you see is just a fraction / beneath carelessness and words unkind / conservative action / conceal a radical mind.” She is a woman becoming.
Her music to me is like a combination of The Indigo Girls and Lisa Loeb. Part folk, utilizing ukulele and acoustic guitar, and part singer songwriter, with powerful poetry like, “Dance on the edge of bliss / We’re tumbling off the precipice / But I’m not afraid / …You make me dizzy.” It is her second release that I can tell, after her EP, I’ve Never Been More Aware, which is also a song on this album, Not My Masterpiece. But the arrangements and vocal performance on the album are miles ahead of the EP.
It’s a temptation for songwriters to rely solely on the basics, vocals and an accompanying instrument, to get the story across, but this album is full of beautiful arrangements and accompaniments. Satisfying, heart piquing additions, like the clarinet on “Doorstop” or the hand drums on “Waltz.” The album finds her in a place, processing failed love and forging personal trust. Songs like “Broken Heart” find her gaining confidence in herself in the face of a cheating, uncommitted partner. “I never knew you wanted to be free / I never dreamed you would say that to me.”
Songs like “Cute Girls With Glasses” look at what it’s like to be the center of attention, but not want or promise to carry the load of other people’s expectation. “I’m just a cute girl with glasses who plays ukulele / Expected to serve as a cheap form of therapy / You’re building me up / And I’m always letting you down.” It speaks to how there can be something unfair and illusory about the spotlight. Keely is just a person herself, with her own struggles and difficult past, which she bares to the listeners of her album.
Overall, it’s a convincing album, especially for someone who seems to be towards the beginning of her A Game. There are rhymes that seem to cut corners, here and there. “So go ahead and leave me in the dust / I’m not in the mood to put up a fuss,” for example, leaves a bit to be desired. For me, as a writer who is developing myself, I find inspiration in both the audacious songwriting and production of the album. It is brave and honest, in a self-love manner, sharing some of the warts and scars as well. The way a good conversation with a friend might be.
It’s notably titled, Not My Masterpiece, and perhaps Keely is making a concession. This is a good record, but I can and will do better. It’s not my magnum opus yet. It’s her, in progress, just as her lyrics make clear about her. While some artists try to hide behind their art, Keely is putting herself out there and hoping that you can relate. She writes with hope and confidence that her songs will be a “Guiding Light” to her listeners. As she sings on the song, “Every cloud has a silver lining / But all I saw was grey / Then I heard your voice beside me / Your song showed me the way / Through the endless path of night / You were my guiding light.” It is one of the wonders of music and songwriting, that we can be a guiding light, even as we’re finding our own way through the twists and turns of life. A solid offering from a developing songwriter and person, Keely Burn.
Prism Reviews 