Leah Flanagan

Songstress Leah Flanagan has long been known for her highly unique take on the blues and folk genre throughout her local Northern Territory. In recent times, she has moved on to make her mark on subsections of the wider national community, playing festivals such as Woodford and East Coast Blues and Roots, as well as performing alongside various musicians in the Black Arm Band, a group that promotes and celebrates modern Australian Indigenous music. With the fresh release of her second album Nirvana Nights, the Darwin darling now appears set to capture the hearts and minds of everyday Australians – and perhaps, the world – with her smart lyrics and moving melodies.
Coming from a family riddled with artists and architects, Flanagan’s creative destiny seems to have taken shape from an early age. After penning tunes and playing with words as a youngster, she went on to study opera in South Australia.
As I listened to Flanagan’s silky vocals on Nirvana Nights, I couldn’t help but briefly dream that somewhere, some South Australian university might possess the ability to train me to sing with the same absolute perfection that this young Darwinian does. Unfortunately for me, no South Australian learning institution could ever even come close to succeeding in this task: Flanagan’s voice – which she employs with ease to tackle big ballads, heart-warming melodies and everything in between – is a pure, raw and matchless kind of talent.
With a culturally rich ancestral line (Flanagan has Indigenous, Italian and Irish heritage), the singer-songwriter seems to enjoy a natural story-telling ability. The tracks on Nirvana Nights exemplify this, conveying tales of love, loss and country to the listener with “Goodbye”, “Alyawarre Girl” and “September Song” all possessing elements of great stories. The album’s title track is even included in this, with its namesake being a bluesy Darwin bar in which Flanagan frequently played her songs.
Melodically, Flanagan moves effortlessly between guitar, piano and ukulele throughout Nirvana Nights and wow, can that girl play some mean ukulele. Overall, the instruments merge with Flanagan’s voice charmingly, producing a soulful and unique blend of music that is easy to listen to. The album reflects the musings of this wise and talented musician uncannily, conjuring strong images of easy-going evenings in the redness of a natural Australian setting. - The AU Review

Day three, and the sheer length of this year’s festival is starting to dawn on us. Almost half way there, but still a whole day of music to get through. So, taking a deep breath, we venture to the Mojo stage for Darwin based singer/songwriter Leah Flanagan. Having been discovered by festival organizer Peter Noble in a Darwin club, Flanagan brings with her the tropical flavor of the coastal north, as opposed to that of the dusty central Australian landscape that so many before have done. Sharing stories of people and places, old Darwin and new Darwin. Her songs reflect her surroundings and experiences, often trading her guitar for a ukulele, which seems to evoke the salty air and warmth of the top end. It’s not surprising that Jimmy Buffet personally asked Flanagan to be the opening act for his most recent Australian tour. Her strong connection with not only her indigenous heritage, but also her Irish and Italian descent makes for a striking combination of Australian indigenous folk, country, and rock, with the occasional upbeat Caribbean-tinged ragtime song on the ukulele. When Leah Flanagan plays, she brings home with her, giving every listener a taste of the north, and presenting an invitation to visit as soon as possible.
- Timber and Steel

Larry Heath interviews Leah Flanagan at the Byron Bay Bluesfest. (watch the link) - AU Review

While Busby Marou's recent success has shown me what the Ukelele is capable of when virtuosically shredded, Leah Flanagan plays the instrument as I've always felt it was intended. A lightly strummed accompaniment to a summer ballad, only complete when in the presence of grass skirts and coconut shells.

September Song is typical of Leah's songwriting, country folk with a hint of swooning jazz. I had the pleasure of seeing her play at WOMADelaide over the Labour Day weekend. She and her band held sway over about a thousand festival goers, stretched out in the sun on the grass in the beautiful botanic gardens, mid afternoon, barely believing the weather, drinking unfiltered South Austrlian beer and eating oysters. Call me decadent but listening to her sing and play the ukelele in those surroundings was pretty close to paradise for me... Leah was on the bill as a rising star of Australian songwriting, a singer of indigenous heritage, a unique and charismatic presence on stage and a collection of honest songs informed by life in her home town of Darwin.

It was this writers first visit to the WOMADelaide festival and I spent much of the time facepalming myself in regret for not having been earlier. Several hundred kilometres to the east Golden Plains and the Port Fairy Folk Festival were rocking, I'd taken a risk and skipped them this year looking for a different experience. Meanwhile, thousands of miles away a veritable army of Australian musicians and music industry types were on their way to South By Southwest in Austin, Texas. I wasn't jealous, I was taking part in one of the worlds great festivals.

The greatest beauty of WOMADelaide is discovery. Not just finding new artists, but discovering entire musical cultures and genres that you never knew existed. Dereb the Ambassador (Ethiopian superstar living in Sydney) was another local highlight. He's recently recorded an album of authentically recorded Ethiopian pop with Hip Hop producer Tony Buchan which we can't wait to get our hands on.

30,000 people each year go to WOMADelaide, those that have been there before know what I'm talking about, beautiful relaxing and inspiring. I'll be back next year. - Air

Leah Flanagan
Saturday – Morton Bay Stage

I feel like I should have seen Leah Flanagan before but for some reason our paths have never crossed. Luckily for me this has all changed after I caught her set at the beautiful Morton Bay Stage, WOMADelaide on Saturday.

Flanagan plays and sings a wonderful laidback bluesy style of folk that suits both her nature and her background (being originally from the Top End). She has surrounded herself with a group of like minded musicians giving her performance a chilled atmosphere (helped along by Leah’s ukulele), almost like you’re sitting in a beer garden on a lazy Sunday afternoon or browsing the wares at a beachside market. I was particularly impressed with Flanagan’s fiddle player, the exotically named Netanela Mizrahi, who seemed to lift the songs to a new level, adding an element of harmony to the lead vocals and filling out the sound.

Leah Flanagan is a true storyteller and her songs evoke a sense of place and community. Her easy going stage presence immediately disarms the audience and has them smiling and nodding their head along to her songs. This was one of the few smaller concerts I’ve seen so far at WOMADelaide where the audience continued to swell as the set went on, with every corner of shade co-opted by a happy punter – my guess is that many many people who didn’t know Leah Flanagan’s music popped by just to check her out and were hooked in by what they saw.

At one point Flanagan introduced a song for (or about?) her Nana with this statement: “The beauty of songs is that they can remind you of people, even if it’s not about them”. I think he truly captured this experience for me and I look forward to crossing paths with Leah again and again in the future.
- Timber and Steel

Leah Flanagan is one of those performers that has been on my list of ‘must see live’ for far longer than I would like to admit. I had heard so many good things about her live shows from so many people and when I finally got my chance to see Leah perform during the Adelaide Cabaret Festival for her Midnight Muses: It Begins To Tell gig at the Festval Theatre I was not disappointed.

Leah’s absolutely gorgeous voice told stories penned and inspired by poet Sam Wagan Watson in such a way it drew the audience into the characters lives. It is a great testament to a writer to be able to express with such passion and empathy, the loves, joys pains and regrets of a character in their poems or songs. Flanagan delivered these stories with such sweet and emotive music that it was hard not to feel a great connection with these characters in many ways if non other than just the sheer longing to be heard and understood by another.

Backed by an amazing five piece band consisting of drums, guitar, piano, double bass and cello, Leah gracefully presented her beautiful yet sometimes haunting tunes occasionally joining the band on guitar and ukulele. From the very beginning of the set, Leah’s music transported you to that pub late at night when the crowds have gone and only the unique and wonderful characters remain, telling their stories of lost love, regrets, happy memories and the hope of what is yet to come.

Chloe in the window is the story of missed opportunities and the yearning to know what could have been after a brief love affair. The story of the ex-prize fighter in the song Midnight Boxer was a wonderful tale of a legend who lived his life fighting in the traveling boxing tents but is now unknown and just wants his story to be told. My favourite track from the evening was one of Leah’s original tunes called Bay of Broken Dreams, about a man sitting at a pub in Darwin looking out over the bay and thinking about the love he knew and let slip away. Before playing the song, Leah explains how important it is for a lyricist and poet to meet these characters. She explains that at times when you feel like you have nothing to write about and no more tales to tell you will all of a sudden meet a great and interesting character that will inspire you to tell their story and this was true of Bay of Broken Dreams.

My only criticism of the evening is that with only an hour set to perform her music, Leah missed out on the opportunity to tell the stories behind all of the songs. Being a performance of select poetry I would have loved to hear the explanations on why certain poems were chosen and what emotions were stirred in her as she read them and her feelings towards the characters they are based on. Although if she was allowed more time it is quite possible that Leah wanted the audience to be introduced to the poetry of Watson without influence by her interpretation of the poems other than her musical accompaniment. The chance for the listener to draw what they will from a song’s lyrics and the response of emotion this brings based on their own experiences is what makes story telling songs of this nature such a wonderful art form.

Leah mentioned that an album will be released soon with songs from this project, which I am really looking forward to hearing and will be worth while keeping an eye out for if you were unlucky enough to miss the show. - Faster Louder

An Australian luminary of the art form once told me that cabaret can take many shapes, but at its core it should contain three things: live music, the telling of some kind of story, and direct interaction with the audience. It’s not real ‘cabaret’ unless it manages somehow to blend these three ingredients together. On that basis, Leah Flanagan’s new show is a promising first glimpse of a work which shows great potential.

The Darwin-based Flanagan, who is of Indigenous Australian, Irish and Italian descent, has an increasing national profile as a singer-songwriter in her own right, and is also known as a member of the internationally-acclaimed Black Arm Band. Already this year she has performed at a number of high-profile festivals including Woodford Folk Festival, WOMADelaide, Blue Mountains Music Festival, Ten Days on the Island and Byron Bay Bluesfest.

Musically, Midnight Muses: It Begins to Tell is wonderful. On a cold night in Adelaide, the warmth of Flanagan’s voice takes us momentarily to a tropical beach at sunset; she achieves a gorgeous vocal depth and richness. The performance by Flanagan on vocals/ukulele and her band (Melanie Robinson on cello, Jamie Blechynden on guitar, Matt Earl on drums, Tom Jones on double bass and Brian Manning on keyboards) is slickly rehearsed and faultless, never missing a beat.

Coming to a performance billed as ‘cabaret’, though, I expected something a little more than just great live music. I wanted to hear a story unfold and to feel a genuine connection with the performers, and this is where the show has room to develop and grow.

Flanagan tells us that most of the songs in Midnight Muses: It Begins to Tell are adapted from the poems of a friend of hers, poet Samuel Wagan Watson, and Flanagan approaches these adaptations in both song and spoken word. The lyrical imagery in some songs is captivating, evoking such characters as an elderly, ex-boxing champ reminiscing on his glory days. I found myself wanting to hear more about these people, hoping that they would take shape, but they stayed teasingly fragmentary.

I wanted also to feel that I’d gotten to know Flanagan a little over the course of the show, but as a person and performer she remained elusive. Despite a skilful, charismatic performance, Flanagan’s interaction onstage with the band and with the audience was circumspect; and at 50 minutes the show felt like a brief glimpse of this talented artist’s capabilities.
- ARTSHUB

Opening with a moving interpretation of Thelonious Monk's Round Midnight, it was immediately obvious that she is a singer of expressive ability, blending blues/roots connections with a poetic country/folk feel.
She presented a program of her songs using words by the award-winning indigenous poet Samuel Wagan Watson. Midnight's Boxer told the sad story of the decline of an ex-prize fighter, while Chloe In The Window Box graphically described a potential affair that never proceeded. Occasionally taking up guitar or ukulele, Flanagan was backed by an exceptionally good five-piece group led by Melanie Robinson on cello an instrument perfectly suited to the mood of these songs of longing and personal travail.
There was a down-to-earth narrative linking the songs and her audience engagement succeeded in making a one-hour performance flit past in what seemed just a few minutes.
- John McBeath - Adelaide Advertiser

From performing her own songs at Darwin’s local music hub the Nirvana Restaurant, to now releasing her first album Nirvana Nights at the recent Darwin Festival, music has been a natural progression for singer/songwriter Leah Flanagan.

“The launch was fantastic! I’m really, really happy with how things worked out for the album. This is my album on my own without my usual band, I wrote the songs and it comes from more of a songwriter’s perspective,” said Leah.

Nirvana Nights was recorded by Leah in Melbourne with musical collaborators that she says are also dear friends. It was produced by Stephen Schram and features Liz Stringer who she described as ‘her best mate in the whole wide world and as one of the greatest musicians, instrumentalists, vocalist and songwriters in the country,’ and is also someone who inspires her greatly. In fact, one track on the album recorded by Leah titled ‘Innocent Hearts’ is written by Liz.

With her debut album, Leah says they just wanted to create something beautiful.

“We didn’t really have a lot of expectations. We just wanted to make the songs have a beautiful warm quality,” said Leah.

Indeed they do, the stories told on Nirvana Nights are vignettes of Leah’s life. The title track is about a little music venue in Darwin called the Nirvana Restaurant that has been supporting local musicians in Darwin for nearly 15 years. It’s a place where Leah has performed often and also worked as a waitress.

Another track, ‘September Song’ is about the little things in life that make one happy, and was inspired by a boat called the Day Marie that Leah has sailed on numerous times in the Darwin harbour. She explains it’s about being with friends and being in love. Like the title track, it features the ukulele which gives a tropical, laid back vibe to the music and makes you feel as though you’re right there sailing along with her.

While ‘Goodbye’ is one of the more melancholy tracks off the album, it’s one that Leah says is very special to her, and is all about losing someone that you love dearly, wishing you could do anything to change it. Leah says unfortunately - life doesn’t always work out that way.

Having recently finished up a national tour to promote the album with shows in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Canberra and Adelaide, Leah has earning some great reviews.
Being a self managed artist, she says there’s still a lot that she needs to do to become a successful business person, however, she manages her music career along with her day job which is promoting Aboriginal arts and crafts at the shopfront for the Aboriginal Bush Traders outlet in Darwin.

“It’s always hard to try and balance both worlds. All I want to do is just write more music, that’s my next plan. I’ve always been a fairly musical person, I have studied, I’ve got a degree in music and overall I’m a music appreciator. It just consumes me, it’s my everything, so it was a natural progression to become a musician,” explains Leah.

Performed with the Black supergroup the Black Arm Band at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver in Canada this year has piqued her interest in performing internationally.
“Primarily I just want to write more and play more music,” she says.

“I’m looking into some overseas work. So if anyone who runs a festival overseas wants to book me, that’s fantastic. It’d be great to go to Canada again and meet more of the first nation’s mob there. It’s something I would really like to do. We’ll see how we go.”

For more information about Leah or to hear tracks from Nirvana Nights see Leah’s website at: http://www.myspace.com/leahflanagan
- Deadly Vibe Australia

"saltwater-soaked serenity of the tropical north..." - Awaye, ABC National

**** 1/2
I can't recall the last time a singer/songwriter from Darwin graced the pages of MAG, so welcome Leah Flanagan who earlier this year made the trip to Melbourne to record her second album. Sensitively produced by Steven Schram (The Cat Empire), Flanagan's ethereal voice - first heard in the southern states with The Black Arm Band - is perfectly matched on these tracks with acoustic guitars, double bass, cellos and subtle electric guitars. Her sense of melody enhances songs inspired by her late grandmother and life in the tropical north. Album also includes a cover of Liz Stringers Innocent Hearts.
- Billy Pinnell - MAG

Best known for her role with musical troupe the Black Arm Band, Leah Flanagan is as musically restless as you'd expect of someone with Italian, Irish and indigenous Australian bloodlines. During her second coming, Flanagan offers up slow, swooning acoustic (First Class Lovers) or the saddest of break-up songs (Uneven Stairs). On the emotional flip side, there's the uke-powered September Song, as carefree as the spring breeze, the pure pop of Innocent Hearts, or the woozy, boozy title track.
Equal parts Lucinda Williams and Shirley Bassey, Flanagan is a rich talent and the curse of every music store - just where do you file this?
- Jeff Apter - Sydney Morning Herald

Leah Flanagan Unites Indigenous Australian, Irish And Italian Heritage In Her Unique Country/Folk. By Martin Jones


As is usual, the Bluesfest aims to introduce us to a number of artists on the rise at this year’s festival. Few such introductions are likely to be as welcomed as Northern Territory singer-songwriter Leah Flanagan’s. Though Flanagan’s remarkable voice and distinctive take on folk/country are gradually gaining the national renown they deserve, earning her bookings on festivals such as Woodford and Tamworth, her musical career is only just taking off thanks to the imminent release of her debut album. Indeed, Flanagan will be seizing the opportunity to launch the album at this year’s Bluesfest.
Back in their home base in Darwin, the Leah Flanagan Band are celebrities, opening the Darwin Festival to 6,000 people and earning a 2007 NT Indigenous Music Award for Emerging Act of the Year. Though Flanagan says she grew up in a non-musical family, she found herself surrounded by music socially, and was particularly inspired by local artists like Shellie Morris and Cloudy Davey. Music so enthused Flanagan in her teen years that she earned a degree from the Adelaide Conservatory of Music, an experience that was crucial in broadening her musical experiences.
"I had to explore my musical tastes or influences through just my own personal knowledge and research," Flanagan recalls of her childhood. "Well I wouldn’t exactly call it research, just stumbling upon things – I’ve always had an open mind so if someone says ’you’ve got to listen to this’ I’ll listen to it and go ’oh man that is good!’ Because I come from a family of non-musicians and basically football players. And coming from the NT, you know, there’s only so much Chisel you can handle!"
Whilst a bit of Charlie Pride and whatever she could glean from local radio made up Flanagan’s pre-adolescent musical diet, attending university allowed her to explore the music of her Irish and Italian heritage.
"I love Irish folk songs," she says. "I’ve got a degree in music so I got to explore a lot of traditional songs in Irish and Italian music through that and I spose when you come from a passionate sort of background, those sorts of music are so passionate!"
The other side to Flanagan’s background is Indigenous Australian, and she’s very much aware of the lineage of Indigenous country/folk musicians that, though perhaps more nationally prominent in the ’60s and ’70s, has remained strong in the Territory.
Those influences have combined in a very organic way in Flanagan’s music – she’s steered away from the pop/rock side of contemporary country music to explore folk arrangements driven by acoustic instruments like banjo and fiddle, and delivered with a vocal presentation that seems to owe to something to the great jazz divas.
Flanagan agrees that the band of musicians she has fallen in with definitely helped shaped her music.
"Toby Robinson, for example, who played the Dobro and the banjo on the album, I never thought I’d be working with an instrumentalist such as that. Like I was always a soloist just playing with my guitar and I love folk music. When I was in high school, Jewel was ’like the coolest thing eva!’ you know. But I love acoustic and organic, warm sounding instruments and I think that’s why I always thought, man it would be so great to play with a violinist. And we just asked a couple of friends to come and jam with us and the sounds that we created with those instruments and with a nice bass sound, it was so good. And we went through a few violinists and got Netanela [Mizrahi] who’s playing with us now, and I don’t think I could ever play music and not have a violin in it any more.
"I suppose I like bluegrass but I can’t play bluegrass."
Who can!?
"Yeah really! I like jazz but I can’t play jazz. I like gypsy swing but I can’t play any of that, so we just play what we do and it sounds a little bit different I think."
So Flanagan feels as though this path has lead her to a style she can call her own?
"I definitely think that the one thing we have is that we don’t sound like any other band," she confirms." When people always ask me ’so what do you sound like? What sort of music do you play?’ I’m like ’orrhh I dunno. Come and see us play, that’s a really tough one.’"
Which is exactly what you’ll get the chance to do at Bluesfest. With the album all ready to go, Flanagan is particularly excited about the timing of the Bluesfest show.
I think after the recording of the album we’ve become, I don’t know we’ve set things a little bit differently. We’ve got new songs which we didn’t previously play before the album because we spent so much time focusing on the album, but I think we’re much tighter as a band than we’ve ever been after that process. None of us had ever recorded before so that process so that process made us really tight and really think about a lot of things."
Revealing that the entire album, from the musicians to the artwork, was produced by Territorians, Flanagan affirms that she’s thrilled with the finished album.
"It’s a bit surreal, I feel like a bit of a country hick," she laughs. "But I’m really, really stoked with the way things turned out."

- RHYTHMS

Italian, Irish indigenous Darwinian LEAH FLANAGAN takes ANDY HAZEL on a trip through her upbringing and loving opera in a footy-obsessed family.

Interrupting her day job at an indigenous art gallery to have a chat, Leah Flanagan instantly comes across as exactly the sort of person you’d want to be showing you the results of creative processes; smart, animated, and wholly involved. The more you discover the more Flanagan seems a product of Darwin itself, rendering her both more typical and extraordinary at the same time.

“Everyone in Darwin is very mixed, “ she says, playing down her own Irish, Italian and Aboriginal ancestry. “My background does define who I am as a person, but Darwin is such a multicultural…everybody is Aboriginal or Greek or Indonesian, Timorese, Chinese or a mix…it’s such a broad range of people.” It also seems a great place to be raised to love music, provided you can stand Oz Rock. “The music scene in Darwin is predominantly Cold Chisel cover bands – it’s unusual for us [Leah Flanagan Band] not to be reggae or country or a cover band - but it is changing thanks to festivals and more bands coming up. I come from a really footy-orientated family, so growing up it was always: ‘No, I’m not going to go and play football.’ Music was always my thing and has been since I was a kid, but I never thought of it seriously. I had a lot of support playing music though it doesn’t mean I haven’t had to win people over.” One of those she won over at a local show was an organiser of last year’s Bluesfest, who put instantly added her to the bill, catapulting her to a giant stage where the winning over continued. “That was amazing. It was the biggest crowd we’d ever played to by far. A lot of good things came out of that experience.”

Flanagan has done so well in Darwin that what awards there are to give to musicians there she’s been given, resulting in a local fame that, in typical earthy style, she plays down. “I do alright I suppose,” she says laughing. “I’ve been playing in bands here for a long time and…I do alright”.

After studying opera at Adelaide University, further pursuing her musical heritage and roping in some of the finest musicians she could hope for, Flanagan produced her first album, the recently released Leah Flanagan Band, an entirely Darwinian creation though one that fuses Celtic lilt, Italian bombast and Australiana with ukulele and banjo. “Making the album was a huge learning experience, the only concept I knew was that I wanted a live album. We hadn’t thought about recording much, but after we applied for grants and got them, we got to work. It was all recorded in Darwin and I’m very happy with the outcome, but the next one will be much more studio-based, I’m keen to get more into that.”

Flanagan specialises in personal narratives that take flight with dry evocative imagery, vocal swoops and musical pyrotechnics. While this may differentiate her from other Authentically Australian™ singer songwriters, the inspiration for her songs is ordinary in the extreme. “A lot of the songs are about aspects of Darwin, my stories, stories of my grandmother,” she explains. “It wasn’t very easy for immigrants and indigenous people back in the day. So many people have stories here, and that’s what songwriting is all about I guess, telling stories. Darwin has a lot of history and everyone loves a yarn. People are so friendly and they’ll answer you honestly most the time so storytelling is second nature.” The feelings that Flanagan moves through when singing does seem almost spiritually guided in it’s free-flowing narrative. “I don’t intend to write with a spiritual feeling to my songs, I’m a spiritual person but I don’t think it’s anything that I intentionally do.”
- Inpress

On the side of the road is where I find Leah Flanagan. Not in a ditch or anything, but responsibly pulled over so’s she can make the call to your humble scribe and impart the knowledge on what she’s been up to. As we speak, she’s on her way north to Darwin via Brisbane, having just been in Melbourne with the Black Arm Band – it’s a long road, but for Leah Flanagan, it’s a road she wouldn’t part with if you paid her. Since coming to national attention last year, Flanagan has been somewhat of a success story, her melding of folkish roots songwriting endearing her to crowds all over the country, and not surprisingly. It was really 2008 that was the Year Of Leah Flanagan, the year that launched her, and as such, 2009 has been reasonably quiet, but this my friends is merely the calm before another folky storm.....

.. ..

“Yeah, I tried to take this year off, me and the band, so we’ve only played a few festivals, but I ended up getting a whole lot of other work with other projects, like the Black Arm Band and I did a show with Deborah Conway at the Queensland Arts festival as well,” Flanagan tells of what she has been up to this year. As such, mainly in her home city of Darwin where she’s a bit of a local celebrity, Flanagan has been playing a fair few solo gigs, getting the band in once a month or so, just honing the chops they so adamantly displayed on their eponymous debut LP late last year. And this is where the folky storm comes in – Leah Flanagan Band garnered rave reviews all over, and so a follow-up is definitely on the cards.....

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“Yeah, we’re planning for another record, I’ve got enough songs written, and I guess I didn’t know when I was going to record, but Steven Schram (engineer) who’s gonna do the record said, ‘Too bad, it’s happening in May, I’m giving you a deadline’,” Flanagan laughs. “I suppose all the festivals we’ve played over the past year or so (Woodford, Bluesfest) and the response to the record have really put us up with the people I’ve always admired and listened too…so to be around people like that, they write such amazing songs, I think more than anything instead of writing songs to have fun and play, it’s more like, ‘No, it’s about writing some great songs’. So that’s the only pressure I feel [as a result of my increased exposure], but I don’t let it get to me too much.”....

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Sonically, Flanagan is sticking to what brought her to attention in the first place – that innocent melding of folk and roots music with a jazz undertone, but of course, there’s that wont to evolve. “I still have a mindset of when I write a song of what’s gonna be for the band and what’s gonna be for me,” she muses. “So the sound has shifted I guess, but there’s that base there.” That base, and the fact it’s so solid, is what’s set Leah Flanagan up for where she is now – on the wide open road of roots music in Australia, a road that stretches as far as the eye can see, and a road which Leah Flanagan will be riding for a long, long time..... - Tsunami Magazine