Fee Brown & the Highwater's debut album, The Devil Dressed Me, is one of the most stunning debuts in recent memory. Expertly treading the fine line between alt. country and a kind of folksy soul, richly evocative songwriting and simple storytelling, autobiography and universality, and melody and discord, this is both art of the highest order and a good, old-fashioned, down and dirty fun record to listen to. In addition to the regular four-piece line-up of the band, producer Myles Mumford has expertly woven instrumentation including brass, strings, banjo, Hammond organ and a 100 year-old-grand piano into a listening experience that rewards repeat playings like the re-reading of a classic novel.
TONY MCMAHON - INPRESS
...there continues to be a wealth of seriously good country-influenced artists materialising from the cracks of inner-urban Melbourne Take Fee Brown and the Highwater for example, and her album The Devil Dressed Me. This isn't country in its classic guise, yet it's laden with rich narratives common to the country genre.
The easiest, and laziest comparison is Lucinda Williams, but Williams, for all her many and varied qualities, couldn't write a song like Fitzroy County, in which Brown lumps Fitzroy in the same rich metropolitan category as Paris, Dublin and New Orleans, celebrating the aspects of Fitzroy that none of its competitors can dream of.
Lest there be any intimation of parochial obsession, the rest of the album is permeated by beauty, glory and a sense of style you wouldn't find on the poverty ravaged artists north of Johnston Street. The waltzing elegance of 24 Hours (Bobby's Waltz) would surely bless any modern wedding, Meantime Lover delves in the lingering aches and pains of the emotional condition with the passion of Nick Cave in his more lucid moments and Why Does My Love Walk Away? asks a perennial question in a haunting tone that, if it doesn't get an answer, will at least cause the deserter to feel like shit for running out on commitment.
Brown's lyrics achieve that rare quality of painting multiple stories, depending on your perspective on the present, past and whatever the future holds. There's self-destructive behaviour in The Devil Dressed Me, emotional desperation in Closer, frustration in Holding Me Down and manifest romantic disappointment in Somebody Else's Man. There's a wealth of excellence across the entire album. And it's all real.
PATRICK EMERY - BEAT MAGAZINE
Hell, this CD is worth the price for the opening track alone - a mariachi melodrama of epic scope, tremolo guitars and Mexican trumpets dueling under drunken 'aaah aaahs' and Fee Brown's impassioned narative. Am I in Brunswick or Tijuana? Don't care, I'm intruiged (the song is called '24 Hours (Bobby's Waltz)' by the by.
Fee and the band pick up and run with the sinister swagger set up by this first track in 'Meantime Lover', a little banjo and Hammond backing Fee and some cracking guitar work courtesy of Damian Hooper.
Not every single track is as strong as these openers - that would be too much to ask, but if you like the idea of The Waifs jamming with Lucinda Williams in a mescal-soaked Mexican bar (and how could you not?), check out Fee and her Highwater.
MARTIN JONES - RHYTHMS MAGAZINE
Fee Brown and her band, the Highwater, offer a promising debut with The Devil Dressed Me...[A] dark portrait of deserters, cheaters and dreamers, all existing in a murky world of sinister electric guitars and heavy, doleful percussion. The overall sound is consistent throughout the album, and it certainly fits with the sad tales Brown relays. Devil opens with the sweeping, somber “24 Hours” and then transitions into the desire-fueled “Meantime Lover.” “Fitzroy County” is the brightest spot here, an ironically upbeat tune about home-sickness complete with sunny, strummed guitars and harmonica.
L. BOWEN - PERFORMING SONGWRITER MAGAZINE (NASHVILLE) MAY 2009
I heard Fee Brown & The Highwater’s album “The Devil Dressed Me” on an early grey Sunday morning. It cut through the greyness like beautiful sunshine. This album is what would happen if the Bad Seeds banded with the Dirty Three and Cockney Rebel and happened to bump into a beautiful, world weary singer whose voice wove unexpected magic and subtlety. It is Aussie alt country with a touch of Americana and dark folk. Double bass and jangly guitars, pianos, swelling hammonds, soaring choirs, banjos and strings. And Tim Scanlan’s attacking harmonica on Holding Me Down is inspired.
And just when you think you have the measure of Fee’s voice she coaxes you and drags you in a new direction. The same is true of her wonderful song writing that deals both with familiar urban grittiness and rays of hope with maturity and freshness.
Probably my favourite song on the album is Why Does My Love Walk way. I love the way it lopes along but contains pent up menace and energy with wonderful vocals. But the good songs keep appearing with each new track. From the waltz at the start (complete with mariachi horns) to the rock out at the end, this album demands your attention.
This is an album to be listened to at volume and on regular rotation. I kid you not. As Fee writes in “Somebody Else’s Man” “Isn’t she lovely?”.You betcha!
JOHN CARVER - PBSfm PRESENTER - ACROSS THE TRACKS
It’s not that often a singer/songwriter can capture the imagery and the geography of the material they’re writing, quite possibly, because they are merely imagining it from the comfort of their living room. Yet there is a sense of real characters on a journey within these 10 tracks. In Meantime Lover, Fee and the band sound like they’ve been living in Bob Dylan’s trailer during his ‘70s era, yet allowing the songs gravity to shift into a rousing chorus.
The title track The Devil Dressed Me is a personal favourite and opens with a Carla Bozulich like snarl (brooding and contemplative), yet quickly marches into a bar room romp and makes very tasteful use of cellist Judith Hamann, and as the band pick up the swing you can almost smell the smoke and whiskey; makes you want to dance around your living room swigging a bottle of rum while joining in on the “whoa whoa whoas”.
There are subtle nods to Gillian Welch, Kasey Chambers and The Waifs, but as an artist Fee Brown stands alone with a stunning debut album that is charming, seductive, sincere and full of real life stories.
JONATHAN BYRON - FASTER LOUDER.COM
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