Hallelujah I'm A Dreamer (2015)

Just nine months after the release of her critically acclaimed 2014 album Runaway’s Diary, Amy LaVere has a sweet surprise for fans – Hallelujah  I’m A Dreamer, recorded with husband and noted guitarist Will Sexton, is out April 7 via Archer Records. 

Hallelujah is a sonic portrait. In these 11 tracks, Amy and Will have captured the immediacy of the live show they’ve developed on the road together, reveling in a more stripped-down sound and celebrating the freedoms and limitations that come with it in stunning form. 

Recorded to magnetic tape (with the help of engineer Daniel Lynn and longtime band mate guitarist Dave Cousar) in the course of a few afternoons at Music+Arts Studio, the arrangements are lithe and uncluttered, allowing Amy and Will’s disarming harmonies to rise to the top. At times their voices blend so well you can hardly find the place where they split – it’s a dance matched only by the complimentary guitar work of Sexton and Cousar.  

The gems of the album are its new tunes – the playful and evocative “Cricket (At Night I Can Fly)” and “It’s the Thing to Do,” a co-write with Will – plus a new almost sunny take on the macabre “Red Banks,” which originally appeared on Amy’s 2011 studio album Stranger Me and a sublime cover of David Egan’s “Hallelujah I’m A Dreamer,” the album’s namesake. 

Hallelujah I’m A Dreamer is immediate and striking, a masterfully played (and curated) mix of old, new and reimagined.