Customer Reviews

Lighthouse

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Susan Cowsill and her musical husband Russ Broussard live in Louisiana and went through Katrina losses and the loss of 2 of the Cowsills in recent years. This CD brings more hope than melancholy tones and is very refreshing with repeated playing. This is the perfect offset to the present gulf oil crisis.

The instrumentation is great with guitars, violin, cello, and even 3 surviving Cowsill brothers (Bob, Paul, and John) on harmony vocals on "River of Love" along with Bangle Victoria Peterson Cowsill. Susan's phrasing on "The Way That it Goes" is fantastic. There is plently of Lousiana love in "ONOLA" and "Cresent City Sneaux."

In addition to her own great compositions, Susan also does a tender reading of Jimmy Webb's "Galveston" which originally debuted in the Top 100 in the same month and year (March 1969) as the Cowsills' "Hair," so it feels like a reflective sequel.

Listen to the song samples on line, but rather than downloading the songs, I advise buying the CD package with lyrics contained, this time, plus Susan's swirling art work.

This is a strong follow up to Susan Cowsills' Just Believe It, with timely, and hopeful content. Susan brings back our hopes from the '60s to modern times.

Susan Cowsill's voice is outstanding. Gritty, natural, and full of emotion. Her songwriting, however, is incredible! She weaves a story of her days following Katrina that hit her beloved New Orleans. It left her and her family homeless for a time and grieving for her brother. Susan lets us into her innermost thoughts. We become her friends. It is truly a poignant CD. And is a gift. One of the best indie CDs out there.

Wow. What a great album. Easily the best I've heard in quite some time. How is it that a major talent like Susan Cowsill is relatively obscure in today's music scene?

I don't know, but this is a work of art. A masterpiece.

Just a fantastic experience listening to this recording. Susan Cowsill has matured so beautifully. Awesome and powerful music.

Hurricane Katrina forced us all to reconsider the concept of home. On Lighthouse, Susan Cowsill's longing for home ties the songs together, and the emotions tied to "home" are more complicated. On "ONOLA," she gives up on the city. The possibility that this might not be home anymore is one that most who live here now have gone through, one that has led many to leave.

The need for home is predicated by loss, which Lighthouse deals with when she covers her brother Barry on "River of Love." Since his death during Katrina's aftermath, Susan has remembered him with the song in her live shows, and it has been grueling, exhilarating or healing, depending on the emphasis. Here it's perfectly pitched; Cowsill's feeling her emotions without being lost in them. The pain hasn't left, but it's not driving the performance, either.

None of this would matter if the songs didn't connect, but Cowsill gives herself memorable melodies to sing. The words matter, but unlike many folk rock artists, she doesn't expect them to put the songs across on their own. Because this is a singer's album, Lighthouse feels lighter than this description suggests. There's a theme, but because that theme is expressed through Cowsill, it's also personal, idiosyncratic and engaging.--OffBeat Magazine, May 2010 issue

I never believed that Susan Cowsill could put out an album that was better than her last one, "Just Believe It." I had heard her perform some of the Lighthouse songs live, but just could not imagine what the studio versions would sound like. When I received "Lighthouse," I was stunned. She has a down-home, gritty, draws-you-in type of voice, but she also has written the lyrics, and the CD plays like a theater production, so lyrically visual that you feel like you're walking that Katrina walk with her, and sort of wish you were to ease some of the burden.

This is probably one of the most honest, gripping CDs I have bought...ever. Love it!

I ordered this after reading a good review in the Philadelphia Inquirer. I was a little skeptical, but it's wonderful. Lighthouse is Susan's tribute to New Orleans and her brother who was killed in Katrina's aftermath--it's both heartbreaking and optimistic and her voice is extraordinarily expressive.

Another reviewer put it so well. "Every once in awhile an artist returns from obscurity with an excellent album, and so it is with Susan Cowsill. Lighthouse is the result of a long journey from the sixties-pop sound of The Cowsills, but is well worth the wait."