Across the Hemisphere Keeps Marianne Flemming's Home Studio Band in the Room
A Folk-Rock Record Made Mostly at Home During Lockdown with a Close-Knit Band
Marianne Flemming made Across the Hemisphere mostly in her home studio, under lockdown. Her husband, the guitarist Kevin Neil, played on it, along with Kari Newhouse and Michael Henchman. Olivia Duffy and Kevin Revolinski also stepped in as guests. The album came out on 15 February 2022 as her first full-length record in a decade. It is a folk-rock set of story songs, bluesy guitar leads and real instruments.
Marianne Flemming’s title track sits in the playlist below, so start there before the rest of the album, with every earlier feature gathered on the Marianne Flemming artist profile. Across the Hemisphere came to this desk through PopHits.Co Music Charts, which verifies independent artists and places their releases across its network of music news titles. Press play, then keep reading for the story behind it.
A Home Studio Through Lockdown and Unrest
Flemming’s own album notes are plain about the process. She recorded over several years, mostly at home, through lockdown and a period of unrest. That context explains a lot about the record. For one thing, Across the Hemisphere does not lean on samples or programmed parts. Instead, people play it, on guitar, bass, keyboard, violin and tambourine. Edgar Allan Poets picked out exactly that point when it featured the album. The blog welcomed the sound of musicians playing real instruments, at a time when beats and computers drive so much music.
The credits matter too, because this album depends on its players. Kevin Neil, Kari Newhouse and Michael Henchman carry most of the record with Flemming. In addition, Olivia Duffy and Kevin Revolinski make special appearances. Newhouse also steps forward on one song in particular, as the final section explains. Flemming herself, a singer-songwriter from Ridgefield, Washington, has worked as a professional musician for more than 30 years.
The clearest view of the album’s classic rock side comes in Something Has to Give. It opens the album on Spotify with a bluesy guitar lead. Meanwhile, SongWeb heard its groove as a spaghetti western-style tango. Ruby Red Slippers then goes further in that direction, with blues-rock guitar solos under the vocal. The song also has its own video on Flemming’s YouTube channel.
Listeners who came to folk rock through Bonnie Raitt will recognise the approach. Here, a songwriter’s lyric rides on guitar playing with real blues in it. Similarly, Raitt’s slide guitar has carried her own songs since her first records in the early 1970s.
The Story Songs on Across the Hemisphere Run From Cape Disappointment to the Yellow Brick Road
The writing is where Across the Hemisphere earns its folk credentials. Flemming publishes her lyrics with the album, and they show a songwriter who builds songs around named people and real places. In Something Has to Give, for example, a household strains to breaking point. A father complains about the White House in front of the television. A mother sorts the knives from the forks. Meanwhile, a brother has not been the same since the state cut his medication. According to SongWeb, the song grew out of Flemming’s work as a special education teacher. That fits a lyric so focused on a family under pressure.
Desdamona then moves the action to the Pacific Northwest, where Flemming now lives. Its title character makes her home above the bluff at Cape Disappointment. That headland stands where the Columbia River meets the ocean. Once a week, she reads the names on the wall at the union hall. The second verse follows a fisherman, Jean Jerome, who left home in the 1980s to work at sea. When he returns, his family has gone. Fans of Lucinda Williams will feel at home here. After all, Williams fills the songs of Car Wheels on a Gravel Road with real places and working lives in the same way.
Elsewhere, the writing turns inward. That’s Enough borrows the image of all the king’s horses and all the king’s men. Something cannot go back together, so the song settles on learning to walk on your own two feet. Finally, Ruby Red Slippers takes Dorothy’s story from The Wizard of Oz and turns it into a song about getting through adversity. As a result, it suits the album’s video, because it pairs the most familiar story on the record with its liveliest playing.
From Kitchen-Table Unrest to an Ocean Lullaby, Across the Hemisphere Moves at an Even Pace
Taken as a whole, the running order moves from unrest towards calm. The harder-edged, more political songs give way to love songs. Moonpie, for instance, sets violin against keyboard and electric guitar. Lucky Me, which SongWeb credits as a co-write with Kari Newhouse, turns into a duet between the two voices. The same review describes the title track as a tribute to a friend named Rachel. Illustrate Magazine also heard a funky bassline and an upbeat cadence in it, one of the liveliest grooves on the album.
The record closes on Small Hope Bay, a gentle song with the pace of a lullaby. It turns to the ocean and leaves the listener on a note of hope. For the finishing work, however, Flemming went outside the house. Carlos Severe Marcelin mastered the album at House of Tomato Studios, and Ronnie Carrier handled the design. Many independent songwriters take that route, because an outside master gives songs tracked over several years a consistent finish. In addition, TJPL News reviewed the record and heard a meeting of folk and country in it.
From the AcousticMusic.News curator team: “Start with Desdamona. The tambourine and Flemming’s vocal tone give it the plain, unhurried feel of 1960s folk. Its chorus, an invitation to dance across the floor, lands harder because she sings it so simply.”
Who Should Spend an Evening With Across the Hemisphere
This album suits listeners who like their acoustic folk with a classic rock spine. It also suits anyone who wants songs about real people, told with patience. Above all, it rewards fans of independent singer-songwriters who make records on their own terms.
Follow Marianne Flemming across platforms: Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Bandcamp, YouTube channel, Instagram, Facebook, ReverbNation, and her official site.
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