Amy Cook: “It’s Gonna Rain”
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Throughout her career, Amy Cook has been able to count on her peers to help her out. Early on, she was tapped by Alejandro Escovedo to open for him on a national tour, and he later produced her 2010 effort Let The Light In. Her new album, Summer Skin, boasts an impressive list of collaborators, including Robert Plant, Patty Griffin, Ben Kweller, David Garza, and more. But make no mistake: Even with all her friends’ assistance, Cook is a singular talent in her own right.
Cook grew up in San Jose before making her way to Texas purely by happenstance. She first settled in Marfa, soaking in the poetry of West Texas emptiness so much that it would result in the similarly sparse Bunkhouse Recordings in 2005. Since then she’s moved to Austin, becoming a regular in the local scene while appealing to an increasingly national audience, and as her fans have grown so has her sound. Cook has a remarkable comfort with both acoustic and electric guitars, straddling the line between folk and rock with ease.
Summer Skin continues Cook’s upward trajectory. A lot of artists could get lost with all of the additional guest musicians hanging around, but Cook doesn’t. Her voice, her guitar playing, her songwriting–she’s a triple threat, as she ably proved when she stopped by KUT’s Studio 1A with her band in tow. She kicked off the live set with “It’s Gonna Rain,” a song that appears on the new album with Robert Plant on backing vocals. Here, Cook is accompanied by a string and horn section, but no matter who’s behind her, she always seems to be the center of your attention.
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