Botany Bay: Soulful free rock

Cover art for Broken

I hear the word "soulful" being thrown around quite a lot when it comes to pop, rock, country, R&B, alternative, and just about every other sub-genre of modern popular music, but what does it really mean? To me, the term has always meant the ability to communicate emotion in rich and complex ways. Anyone can sing a sad song or a love song, but the rare artist brings dimension to such emotional content and paints a canvas of emotion from a pallet that is as rich as our own experience.

Such an artist is the Creative Commons veteran band, Botany Bay.

To be perfectly frank, there's quite a lot of junk on Jamendo and other free music sites. It takes me a long time to wade through it and find the gems, but when I do, I'm rewarded for the effort many-fold. Botany Bay was formed in 1995 with a lead singer whose name has since been changed on the band's Web site to protect her after falling prey to Scientology. The core of the current lineup is writer/keyboardist Stephan Kleinert, vocalist Stephanie Mühr, guitarist Wolfgang Springob, and Felix Klöckner. As gems go, the band is as lustrous as I could hope for. Their 2007 album, Grounded, is a 19-track opus whose contents are as varied as any collection I've seen on Jamendo. Some tracks harken to indie folk while others are driven pop-rock pieces. The common theme is that ineffable quality: soulfulness.

Their later albums from 2010 and 2011 feature Mühr's first appearances, and bring an intimacy to the lyrics that was lacking, previously. "A Better Way" from the 2011 album, Broken, is a perfect example. Easily one of their catchiest tunes, there's a melancholy to the song that's somehow uplifting... how do they do that?! The title track of the album is worthy of a movie soundtrack, giving Mühr a real opportunity to shine, along with a piano/violin duo that's wonderful to listen to.

The band cites Pink Floyd, Coldplay and Massive Attack as influences. I'd add Fleetwood Mac to that list, but I can see where they're coming from.