Label: Tea Cup Music

Producer: Sam Hawksley

Release Date: 2003

Bright Window is an astonishingly bright and colourful ear candy album.. here we have a collection of intelligent pop songs written and composed, performed, arranged and produced seemingly with one specific aim in mind... to absolutely knock you out! Rachel sort of does this with ease... her songwriting is first class, her vocals are the stuff of dreams and her collaborating musicians are most certainly a collective force to be reckoned with. What a very very lucky girl she is!

The album opens with Sunny wings.. a lovely, spiritually uplifting song, lyrically positive and vocally enchanting with some of the most amazing bass and drum sequences in particular that provide the wings that make this song soar! Right way to be is such a clever composition with the same degree of expert musicianship that we encountered in the previous song. It's a bright, casual, and colourful song that gives you your first real indication that Rachel Gaudry is very definitely a couple of rungs further up the creative ladder than many of her contemporaries. It must be tough being this innovative while having the unmitigated audacity to maintain and surpass such skill in songwriting and production. Moving on is one of those love songs that we can all relate to but, more importantly, it's a classic example of Rachel's ever evolving artistry and diversity in songwriting expertise. Rachel can obviously apply varied vocal styles and techniques to match and emphasize the spirit of each of her songs.. she does this so well, that the listener has no problem in entering into her world of feeling.

Suppertime features some magnificent word wizardry and you kinda knew this would happen very early on when you first pressed the PLAY button. Watch out for the contributions from the rest of the performers on this track, especially the soft and meaningful meanderings provided by Blaine Whittaker on the clarinet. Screaming alone is one of the best and most original songs anything this genre has ever produced complete with bluesy vocals and exceptional keyboard work. Joni Mitchell once remarked about the level of synchronicity that sometimes occurs between musicians in a studio setting and that's exactly what's happening here.. everyone is playing at their level best to make this song one of the most amazing tracks on the album. I'm not a great songwriter... but had I been responsible for this one... I would literally be walking on air for the rest of my life!

Old wars is a compassionate and empathy-embracing song with extremely beautiful lead and harmony vocals supported by inspiring and emotion-provoking guitars and percussion. The production is exceptional.. but then it has been throughout the entire album! It's a very very clever song for it's orginality and presentation... watch out for the blue sky between grey clouds style slide guitar... you find yourself completely and utterly spellbound and it gets better each time you play it back! Everywhere you go opens with some lovely up tempo piano and then in comes Rachel's smooth and dynamic vocal emphasizing the words in a way that only Rachel can get away with with seemingly effortless ease. It's a lovely song in every sense of the word! Beautiful love meanwhile is one of the most beautiful realized songs on the album.. the playing from all quarters is truly magnificent and the production superb... all the essential ingredients for a classic, meaningful and passionate ballad are here!

Train is another truly clever piece of songwriting and showmanship highlighted by the ingenuity in the composition and production. Depicting the breakdown and of a relationship so subjectively makes the song quite thought provoking on all kinds of levels. The song's strength however, lies in it's 'to the pointedness' and in the almost casual approach to the vocals. Brand new day is one truly wonderful piece of work... vocals and harmonies are, once again, exceptionally well delivered and the magical E-bow guitar inserts from Ben Butler transcends expectations. It's a classic Rachel job to say the least and one that will forever retain the magic that went with it's first hearing.

Shiver is without doubt, a work of true songwriting genius in it's word wizardry and in it's vocal rendition. The girl certainly knows exactly what her voice does to these lyrics when it's applied in this way... it's a truly beautiful ballad that grips your attention immediately and one that leaves you yearning for more. The final track, the instrumental Irish boy sweet features quite a contemporary classical feel to the amazing piano phrasings and finger work. It's an uncomfortably short piece that you would prefer to have had a longer version of, but then in it's 2 minute soujourn, it does everything you'd want to hear.

Bright Window is an apt title for such a colourfully inspired and cleverly produced album. Rachel Gaudry, Australian Empress of Song and Voice, has taken a few tried and tested songwriting formula's and re-conditioned them to come up with something highly unique, classy, and definitive in her own contemporary and intelligent musical style. It's an album filled with superb musicianship at every level and one that should be earning her a fortune not just financially but in terms of the utmost respect from discerning listeners all over the world.

 

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