Shelly Bhushan

"Love 'Beautiful Me' and Shelly's Voice..."
- Phil Ramone

Critic's Choice!
"feisty, kick-ass soul from Bhushan and her band...we think she's great"
- Time Out NY, March 6, 2010

"whooaaa!!! Is that a voice"
- The Volume, TONY.com , April 2009

Shelly Bhushan, 2008 Abe Olman Award recipient for Songwriting
"Beautiful Me" featured song at SHOF showcase

Shelly Bhushan is a Texas native who has been wowing audiences since birth. Prepare to be captivated by her exceptional vocals. Her new album, Picking Daises is available through CD Baby and iTunes. Pick it up if you like what you hear. Be sure to check out the featured tracks Beautiful Me and The Nest.

- Billy Zero, The Radar Report, XM Satellite Radio

Picking Daisies Review

The late Billie Holiday inspired writers to honor her by coining the phrase "The Lady sings the blues," but Shelly Bhushan evokes more of the sentiment "The Lady has groove." Like Holiday, Bhushan has a voice that reaches as far as a rocket's flair glare. Both women are trailblazers when it comes to singing blues, soul, and pop melodies but Bhushan's laments have a unique upbeat tilt to them that magnetically causes her to bounce back from any bout of melancholia transcribed in her lyrics.

Her full length album Picking Daisies, on RedCard Records and produced by guitarist James Cruz, has a wealth of material from soul-jazz to R&B/funk, acoustic rock, and even a twinge of square dancing country, or what Brookes & Dunn refer to as boot-scoot-boogie. The interfacing of intricate orchestral riffs, spruces of piano hooks, reefs of horns and rhythmic dunes creates lush arrangements filled with life. There is so much taken from life in these songs that it doesn't matter if you're a fan of jazz or soul. The album has well crafted songs that transcend musical tastes.

"Perfect Stranger" starts the album off with a funky/R&B groove emanating from the sprinkling piano keys and rhythmic movements which take a back seat to the enchanting bongo solo. Bhushan's vocals plunge, nuzzle, serenade, and smother over the melodic passages like a woman inflamed with emotion. Her sultry vocal curls on "Little Piece" are smoking and become nurturing on the title track and "Beautiful Me." The songs are like nourishment for the soul especially when she breaks into the acoustic session of "Birthday Suit" and recites, "Dressed up in my birthday suit/ It's the first day of my life/ Don't expect you to understand/ Been here a thousand times...Today I walked away from fear that kept chasing me all these year." Her words inspire the depth in the arrangements.

The jazz-pop ballad "Not To Me" begins with a soft, fluid tempo then shifts gears into a full blown symphony bloating the chord progression and jet-skiing the vocal action. The thicket of strings and horn whorls on "Time To Go Home" paraglide through the soul-jazz-cratered peaks and troughs creating a deep caressive motion. The gospel-soul intonations on "Show Me A Sign" have an Oleta James-style phrasing and the blues-soul ballad "It's Over" is primped with melodic strips of hierarchical strings balanced by earthy piano spruces. The final track "The Nest" has a catchy square dancing beat flanked by emotive vocal grooves to match and polished upbeat guitar slants. It's a number you can't get out of your head once it goes in.

The album puts Shelly Bhushan's best foot forward and leads the listener to wonder why these songs aren't played on their favorite radio stations. Soul-jazz isn't usually a format played on Top 40 radio but after hearing Picking Daisies, I just can't tell you why.

Picking Daisies Review

It's sometimes hard to listen to music and think of it outside the context of every other piece of music you've ever heard before. The first time I listened through Picking Daisies, the new album by Shelly Bhushan, I kept getting hung up on that. 'Oh, that piano sounds like something out of Fiona Apple," I would think when listening to the title track, 'That horn run reminds me of that one from that Fishbone tune. That's really cool." But on repeat listens, I was able to take a couple mental steps back and view Bhushan's work on her first full-length album as completely her own, and that, let me tell you, is even cooler. One thing that helps is the nimble genre-hopping she manages across the album's ten tracks.

Backed by a bustling brass section on the harder tunes, those same horns turn jazz-tinged when it's needed just one short song later. A string section bolsters the action (when's the last time you heard strings used in an interesting way on an up-tempo pop song?) one second and makes 'em weep on a ballad the next. Picking Daisies starts with some funk/rock and ends with a country sing-a-long. Reading over her bio (from Texas, moved to NYC to front a soul-rock band), these twists and turns make more sense. A lot of artists get bogged down in the need to not get locked into one style, but Bhushan and her band weave in and out of them quite easily. Her bio also uses the phrase "vocal power" and boy is that dead on. Bhushan's got some pipes and she doesn't hold back. Lucky for us.

Hahamusic
- Adam Jacobson

Picking Daisies Review

Singer-songwriter Shelly Bhushan's debut solo album Picking Daisies will be released on September 20th. Her music has been compared to that of Joss Stone, but I find Shelly's soulful voice and retro musical style to be more authentic and enjoyable. Her velvet-textured vocals are here layered with pop-soul melodies, funky bass, and jazzy piano.

Highlights are the catchy opening track "Perfect Stranger", the bluesy wail and smashing

piano of "Picking Daisies", the brass and strings of "Beautiful Me", the sexy "Little Piece", the classic soul style of "Show Me A Sign", and the surprising hint of twang in the upbeat, clap-happy finale "The Nest".

- Muruch

The Top Best Female Artist Overlooked in 2006

Nominees: Emm Gryner, Miwa Gemini, Shelly Bhushan, Fiona Joy Hawkins Marisa Yeaman Mary Lee Kortes of Mary Lee's Corvette Theresa Miele La Petite Jacqueline (Jacqueline Francis) Robin Aigner of Royal Pine Music Mandy Ventrice

Winner: All All of these female singer-songwriters put out brilliant albums in 2006 but little attention was given to them other then the traffic they garnered on their myspace sites. With a team of family and friends, they booked their own tours and sold their CD's out of a suitcase in the back of the clubs they played. They worked their hearts out to make enough money for gas, food, laundry, maps, and phone calls to club owners to book their next show. It is the life of a nomad and yet these women would not trade in that caravan lifestyle. They do it so they can share their songs with audiences and make an impact on peoples lives like the way people have inspired songs in them.

- Treblezine, Susan Frances