COURTNEY Marie Andrews is Damien Jurado's lead guitarist, but Honest Life is the breakout album that should see the itinerant Phoenix, Arizona musician become better known in her own right.
Ryan Adams calls her "a phenomenal songwriter", and he's not wrong. Even in the crowded court of country-folk and female singer-songwriters, Courtney's craft means she can brush aside comparisons with Joni Mitchell and latterly Americanised English rose Laura Marling.
On the restless road from age 16, she has been a session and back-up singer and guitar player for 40 artists over a decade, but has still released five solo albums since 2008. At 26, Honest Life is the crossroads record, written when heartbroken and homesick for family and friends in the USA but stuck in Belgium for months on end.
She wrote of desire for home, and once she returned and worked in a bar, she wrote of belonging, of "trying to live our most honest life", like the people she served. Rookie Dreaming, Irene, Honest Life, 15 Highway Lines, all belong in your home.
Courtney Marie Andrews supports The Handsome Family at Leeds Brudenell Social Club on February 27.
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