New York based singer/songwriter Emma Frank returns with a new album for 2019 entitled Come Back following the success of her critically acclaimed 2018 release, Ocean Av.
Brooklyn resident Emma has a sound so multifaceted it intertwines folk, R&B, and even jazz to create shifting tempos and winding melodies that are poignant, propelling and all-engulfing. Having recently signed to Justin Time/Nettwerk Music Group, Emma shares her leading single, “I Thought”, along with a stunning video directed by visual artist Ayo Tsalithaba filmed in the suburbs of Toronto.
Throughout the new album, Emma taunts with ideas of love, lust, self-doubt, commitment and sadness to relinquish the most intimate corners of her mind with her listeners. Emma’s songs are journeys of self-discovery, framed by insightful lyrics and her warm, gossamer voice that songwriter Leif Vollebekk described as "like leather on silk." Of “I Thought”, she says, “My mother to this day reminds me that I have a tendency to polarize things. ‘I Thought’ is a reminder that we can grow and change and still be committed to those we love and the work we do.” The subdued strings and soft strokes of the piano keys enhance the raw, honest feeling driving this track.
The long project takes a nostalgic turn with the next single, a cover of Grammy award winning band Wilco’s “Either Way”, expressing the simplicity and vulnerability of the lyrics that speak to Emma on a personal level – out 7th June. Next up we have “Two Hours”, with the haunting hold of the lyrics ‘Still two hours to go/until we come home’, speaking on the unproductivity of boredom and seeking an answer to the question ‘When does solitude become loneliness?’
“Dream Team” brings a new approach to the project, seeing Emma materialise a fondness of hers: lyric-less vocalizing. Written by ex-boyfriend and creative partner Simon Millerd who contributes on the trumpet for this ambient, soothing one and a half minute interlude.
Emma leaves us with a resounding conclusion, initially an ode to her father on “Before You Go Away”, Emma reached the actualization during a high energy, high intensity studio session that this song was in fact written to herself. The beautiful croons meet the guitar strings and deep bass to engage the sentimental and reflective essence of the song leaving a tremendous urge for more from the folk singer.
Born and raised outside of Boston, Emma moved to Montreal in 2006 to study literature at McGill University. Whilst there she began performing regularly, releasing two critically acclaimed albums under her own name on the Montreal-based label, The 270 Sessions and performing vocals and brass with art-pop ensembles She's Got a Habit and Malcolm Sailor's Songs. After coming to New York in August of 2015 to perform in Franky Rousseau and Dominic Mekky's chamber opera April, Emma decided to move to Brooklyn. It's there that she penned the songs on Ocean Av and Come Back.
New single “I Thought” out now. Come Back is out on September 6.
European tour dates coming soon including London.
