Reeve Coobs

What Love Is All About is Reeve Coobs' first full-length studio recording, and is set for release at the end of summer 2013. The warm, hazy days of the pre-autumnal South seem to provide the perfect setting for a record that reflects joy, heartbreak, redemption and loss, in songwriting that is at once universal and deeply personal. From song to song, the music moves from melancholia to sweetness to suppressed rage, with a bit of whimsy sprinkled throughout. The common thread is love, with its many and sometimes nearly unrecognizable incarnations.

What Love Is All About is eclectic yet cohesive. Reeve's unique new sound doesn't stray too far from her original folksy-pop beginnings; but it represents a more rocking, more mature incarnation of her music. She and her producer Jeff Williams have created a soundscape of acoustic and electric influences that feel familiar yet are distinctly original. "Jeff has been such a huge part of my songwriting these past few years.  He has really pushed me to be better and he's shown me how to mold a plain melody and lyrics into something interesting and beautiful.  I feel like we share the same brain sometimes, he'll record a guitar part over one of my songs and I could swear it's exactly what was playing in my head while I was writing it."

Around 2002, after moving back to The Carolinas Reeve began working at the Evening Muse, Charlotte's premiere listening room.  "The Muse is what really started my career, I have Joe [Kuhlmann] and Lea [Pritchard] to thank for everything.  I worked there almost every night and would play every open mic and every other chance I could get.  It was such a great way to learn about this crazy business." Eventually Reeve found herself playing an average of two shows a week while supporting herself with work as a nanny.

Prior to this time Reeve was mainly interested in folk music with hints of soul and pop, but through working at The Muse and getting to know the local musicians her style started to morph into her own sound all together. Her own unique sound blends alternative-rock with americana and pop and occasionally hints of soul. Her ears were opened to new music from artists like Gemma Hayes, Those Bastard Souls, and Patty Griffin. She began performing original sets of her music at local open mic's and coffee shops adding in more and more of her new sound into each set. Finally, she began to feel at home in her own original sound.

In 2005, Reeve was selected as the Creative Loafing Reader's Choice for Best Female Vocalist. That year also marked her increasing involvement with "all-gal Americana supergroup" The Near Misses. The band toured all over the south-east and released two recordings (still available on iTunes and CD Baby).  The Misses were also the recipients of many awards including the "Best Female Vocalist" Critics Pick for the 2008 Creative Loafing Best of Charlotte, Best Band Readers Choice Award for the 2006 Creative Loafing Best of Charlotte: International Edition, and the "Best New Band" award in the Arts & Entertainment category of the 2005 Creative Loafing Readers Choice Awards.

What Love Is All About is a collection of songs written from Reeve's love of late-nights, years of relationships gone wrong, hard living, and bad mistakes. Reeve writes about love gone wrong "You said you'd always be near. You said you'd always been clear. You said you'd never lied. Well then I guess that you've been caught." in the song Caught. In Happy Being Wrong she sings "It's all my fault, why I am this way. Wish I could pin it on you, but you've made your own mistakes." letting her audience in on her shame from past mistakes. In fan-favorite, Night Owl, she writes about staying up late with friends, drinking, listening to music, and unpacking the unhappiness of each other. Although this record is full of hard and sad topics it still has an overarching happy theme. You can sense that Reeve has lived and learned and is writing from that perspective. She has fought with her demons and has lived to write and sing about it.