Laurel - New Waves

Whilst the internet and music is global (‘Guten morgen’ our sizeable readership from Germany and to our massive American audience we hope you ‘Have a nice day’) where possible Breaking More Waves loves to feature the occasional act from our more local environs. Whether it’s our particular taste (quite probably) or a dearth of talent in the south-coast-central area of the UK, but it happens less often than we’d like it to. In fact we usually end up posting more music from Brighton, the hyper-arty seaside cousin down the road than we do the Portsmouth / Southampton district. Occasionally something does grab our ears – the likes of Curxes (of whom technically one half of hails from the Portsmouth area) and Bear Cavalry have both got the Breaking More Waves treatment (and we’ve subsequently become huge fans of Curxes in particular) and The Hall Of Mirrors (whose roots are in Portsmouth) have also found our favour in the distant and more recent past.

So today we’re very pleased to feature another south-coast belle and this one is really rather lovely.

Laurel is an 18 year old singer songwriter. She used to go by the name Under the Laurels, producing raw acoustic music that owed some debt to Laura Marling and could be found putting out videos of her strumming her heart out in flowery summer fields in pretty dresses. It was all pleasant enough but didn’t have the depth of Marling or any of her contemporaries; that is until recently.

For Laurel (full name Laurel Arnell-Cullen) has released the beautiful Next Time, a staggering improvement in every respect, and not a bit like Marling. With church like pianos, a voice that gets near angelic and a string arrangement that kisses with the lightest of heavenly touches Laurel has created something just a little bit special here;  a subtle piece of hypnotic and restrained beauty. We hope that it’s not a one off. If it isn’t it won’t be the last time you see the name Laurel Arnell-Cullen here; we can guarantee that.

Laurel - Next Time