GARRISON BAILEY: Into the Mirror I Sing

Garrison Bailey may be the most under-the-radar singer you’ve never heard of. Her album, Into the Mirror I Sing, Chapter 1, features her soulful voice in a tribute to the many singers she has been influenced by with personal “love letter” verbal introductions throughout the album’s 14 tracks.

The CD was recorded at her own home studio in East County, produced and engineered with her keen sense of rhythm as a skilled drummer, creatively mixing synthesized funky bass and guitar lines, horn and string arrangements, and percussion syncopations. Many of the standard tunes are given a whole new funkified facelift or, as Bailey puts it, I “Garrify It.” Additional live-track contributions feature Sue Palmer onpiano and Marc Intravaia and Wayne Riker on electric guitars.

The album opens with Bailey’s narrative of how she was six years old, singing along to Linda Ronstadt’s “Love Is a Rose,” followed by turning Ronstadt’s jug band arrangement into her own blues-drenched vocal interpretation, followed by an Olivia Newton John double dose of full on funk groove vocals over “Let’s Get Physical” and “Magic.”

Bailey has no problem replicating a strong vocal presence on the two pop classics, Madonna’s “Borderline” and Cyndi Lauper’s “Time After Time,” before launching into an all out R&B blues soaked vocal arrangements of three tender ballads: Dolly Parton’s “I Will Always Love You,” the Judds’ “Young Love” and the Chicks’ “Wide Open Spaces.”

Next, Bailey delivers a verbal love letter to Sheryl Crow before ripping into a soulful vocal rendition of Crow’s “My Favorite Mistake.” “She has really impacted my life as a singer,” Bailey narrates, “I even have a tattoo of one of her songs on my back…she’s an amazing human being.”

Bailey cites the musical artist Pink as an important voice for equality rights as Bailey fires up her vocal pipes for her funky vocal version of “Sober.”

In addition, Bailey pays tribute to local artists as well. First, Lisa Sanders, as Bailey describes as an inspiration in her career to write and play music, as she sets a soulful vocal groove on Sanders’ tune, “Shiver.”

Next a verbal tribute to local singer/songwriter Cathryn Beeks, whom Bailey describes as an amazing human being who has so much love and empathy, as she “garrifies up” an R&B-soaked vocal version of Beeks’ tune, “Message to You.”

On the final track Bailey notes her admiration for singer Eve Selis, describing her as one of her favorite top ten voices of all time, presenting a bluesy vocal version of Selis’ tune “Just Three Words,” co-written with Intravaia, whose blues-laden guitar solo is introduced as a final coda.

In conclusion, I’ll leave you with Bailey’s own words that alludes to Kelly Clarkson and Bailey’s own vocal version of “Since U Been Gone.” “I’ve been obsessed with Kelly Clarkson ever since I heard her on American Idol. I’ve been covering the song “Since U Been Gone” while singing and drumming at the same time, which is the way I want to go out in this life, hitting those high notes and falling over backwards from my drum kit.”