With her dazzling new EP Heart In Tennessee singer-songwriter Teni Rane firmly establishes herself as a glorious musical force to be reckoned with by giving us a brilliant collection of six songs that illustrate a wonderful ability to capture and communicate complex and simple emotions and observations in a way that we can all relate to in one way or another. If you as a listener and fellow music lover accept her invitation to join her on this brief musical jaunt, I implore that you won’t be disappointed.
Over the course of the six sparkling musical creations on the record (all written by her), Rane draws you in with her warm, affecting, and powerful voice and while you can hear the influences of Joni Mitchell, Jewel, Corinne Bailey Rae, and countless other exceptional female folk and country singer-songwriters of the last four or five decades in her songs, you can also hear the mesmerizing sound of an burgeoning and singular talent who is prodigiously steeped in the ability to express herself in a fresh and original manner.
From the touching titular track “Heart In Tennessee,” to the playful and road ready “Cruise Control,” to the stirring and strong willed “Numb (Dragonfly),” to the wonderfully defiant “Flexibility,” to the poignant and delightful “Park Hill,” and to the closing celestial and altogether resplendent number “You’re My Star,” Rane’s songwriting abilities, both musically and lyrically, are on full display and are simply awe inspiring.
While I am always somewhat hesitant to make predictions about what is going to happen when it comes to the capricious, mercurial, and oftentimes inconsistent and illogical entity known as the music industry, I am comfortable about making one about Teni Rane.
Based on just these six songs on this magnificent EP, I firmly believe she has gloriously asserted and declared herself to be, here at the end of 2020, as an artist to be watched and followed in 2021 and beyond and that she has set herself on a path that will lead to her being recognized as the superior talent in our collective sonic landscape that she is now and will be in the future. If there is any musical justice in the world, this will happen and happen soon.
Credits: Teni Rane -Vocals, Acoustic Guitar, Jonathan Shumaker-Bass, Recorded and Mixed at Crooked Wall Studios, Sound Engineer-Brian Ward
Heart In Tennessee (self released) by Teni Rane is now available here .