Keyboards, drum machines, and love songs …

What happens when a girl who grew up singing Amy Grant songs into her hairbrush teams up with a guy who raised himself on New Order and wore only black for ten years? They make the dreamy, penetrating songs that have emerged for the upcoming album by LA-based dreampop artist Shannon Curtis, as helmed by her producer/mixer husband Jamie Hill (Jens Lekman, Chris Bathgate, Nada Surf).

Shannon says of the record (as yet untitled):

“Our aim is to conjure the sound of the movies that play in your head, the words you wish you’d said in the moment, the feelings you just haven’t been able to shake.”

Early reviews describe the new material as “hypnotic,” “like being caught in a dream,” and “incredibly beautiful.”

Buzzbands.la recently described Curtis’s sound as “downtempo dreampop.” The Los Angeles Times has described Curtis’s voice as being “like the love child of Fiona Apple and Norah Jones.”

The Boulder Weekly puts it more vividly: “Curtis makes music that makes you want to dance in your underwear or cry in your beer.”

Curtis has released 3 EPs, and one acoustic LP over the last 4 years, all on the small independent label Saint Cloud Records. Saint Cloud has sold over 10,000 of those records to date, and Curtis’s songs “Boomerangs & Seesaws” and “Before the Sun” have been featured on ABC Family’s Pretty Little Liars and MTV’s The Hills, respectively.

The new album’s first single, “Brightest Light In The Room,” was released digitally worldwide by Saint Cloud Records on May 31, 2011. The song was inspired by and written for two of Curtis’s fans — both retired female US Army veterans of the war in Iraq — on the occasion of their wedding engagement.

Curtis’s new single, “Let’s Stay In,” was released digitally worldwide by Saint Cloud Records on October 25, 2011. A limited-edition 11-track CD “mega-single” of the song was released concurrently, and features seven remixes, an instrumental version, an a cappella, an exclusive B-side, and a miniature collectible print of an original artwork created specially for the song by artist Katie Zeigler (ktblue.com). Highlights include two remixes by Grammy-winning DJ and remixer iLL MEDiA (Mickey Avalon, Kylie Minogue, Dirt Nasty, Tom Waits).

“Brightest Light” and “Let’s Stay In” have been getting multiple daily plays on internet radio giant soma.fm for the last few months. Tune in to their “Lush” station and check it out!

Shannon’s previous Saint Cloud Records releases are:

Boomerangs & Seesaws (EP, 2007)
Paris Can’t Have You (EP, 2008)
Why Don’t You Stay? (EP, 2009)
“I play the piano and sing love songs” (acoustic LP, 2010)
Brightest Light in the Room (digital single and CD maxi-single, 2011)
Let’s Stay In (digital single and CD mega-single, 2011)

Why Don’t You Stay? was produced in Nashville by Grammy-winning producer Charlie Peacock (The Civil Wars, Sixpence None The Richer, Switchfoot), and was mixed in Los Angeles by noted mixer Joe Zook (One Republic, Modest Mouse, Katy Perry).

Constant touring (over 150,000 miles in her VW Jetta in the last 4 years) and placements in TV and film have been building Shannon a devoted and growing following across the country.