11/6/2023 0 Comments Ingrid michaelson lights out iconIn a marked departure for the solo artist, Michaelson worked with a team of ten different songsmiths including Nashville’s Trent Dabbs and Barry Dean, singer-songwriter Katie Herzig, and writer/producer Busbee (Pink, Katy Perry, Lady Antebellum) to craft the album’s 14 songs. Her fifth studio album, Lights Out, finds Michaelson looking to increase her market position with minimal risk. An independent artist in the sense that she remains unsigned, Michaelson continues to front her own career, releasing music on her own label under the guidance of the management team who discovered her in 2006. With every step, Michaelson’s commercial appeal has benefited from lucrative placements ranging from an Old Navy ad (“The Way I Am”) to TV soundtracks ( Grey’s Anatomy, Parenthood, Ugly Betty) and a cross-promotion with retailer Anthropologie for the release of her 2012 album, Human Again. Over the course of her carefully choreographed career, Michaelson went from MySpace discovery to ukulele-wielding kewpie doll and piano balladeer. In it, Michaelson ruminates on the small details of her everyday life, singing "We make bread on Sundays and the little ones are climbing the walls/Up the walls/Nothing lasts forever but the sound of love astounds me every time that it calls." Ultimately, on Lights Out, Michaelson has captured that sound of love.Beginning with her 2010 single “Parachute”, Ingrid Michaelson began the transformation from singer/songwriter to pop chanteuse. Elsewhere, we get the catchy dance-pop duet "One Night Town" with Mat Kearney and the uplifting anthem "Afterlife." There's also a very in-the-moment feeling of both poignancy and happiness to Lights Out, which is perhaps best expressed in the midtempo Beatlesque ballad "Wonderful Unknown," featuring Michaelson's husband, singer/songwriter Greg Laswell. Cuts like the bluesy, handclap-heavy "Warpath" and the similarly fiery "Time Machine," with its '90s-esque sax samples, are more emblematic of the album's ambitious, empowered tone. While there are a few of Michaelson's trademark intimate breakup songs here, including the tear-inducing "Open Hands," overall the album reveals Michaelson to be in a bright, upbeat state of mind. Michaelson even reunites with longtime collaborator Dan Romer for the epic ballad "Over You," featuring A Great Big World. This time out, Michaelson has enlisted a handful of producers who include, among others, her bandmate bassist Chris Kuffner, Jacquire King ( Modest Mouse, Norah Jones), and singer/songwriter Katie Herzig. Michaelson even seems to reference that album with her Lights Out lead single, the infectious "Girls Chase Boys." However, where Girls and Boys centered around Michaelson's intimate ukulele and acoustic guitar-driven dorm room pop, Lights Out features a broadened sonic palette and a much more robust vocal performance it's a transformation she's been perfecting since 2009's Everybody and 2012's Human Again. Ingrid Michaelson's sixth studio album, 2014's Lights Out, is a polished, well-produced effort that magnifies all of the sounds and lyrical themes she's been working with since breaking through with 2007's Girls and Boys.
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