Marilyn Scott: Walking With Strangers

Full of warm arrangements, engaging harmonies and smart, universally themed lyrics, Walking With Strangers (Prana Entertainment 8 06863001-2; 57:41) is another quiet triumph for singer-songwriter Marilyn Scott. Backed by a small, tight ensemble, Scott practices song craft that matches arrangement to theme. This rare quality is evidenced from the outset, as opening cut “Loving You” uses timing changes to reflect lyrics about changes in attitudes about love. Likewise, the album’s title track utilizes a bustling, rubberband rhythmic mix and keyboard mystery to examine the way people can become so lost in their own lives that they miss out on what’s important (sample lyric: “We run into places, faces/missing everything/walking with strangers”). A quiet, sacred feel opening “No Room for Hate” moves into a sweet, upbeat pop texture of hope. It helps that Scott’s straight-up alto vocals and jazzy phrasing have an instrumental quality, keying the old-fashioned gospel soul of “Don’t Let Love Get Away,” an exploration of redefining love over a long term and finding new passion, and digging in to the earthy romantic swagger of Brenda Russell’s “All of the Above.”

Originally Published March 1, 2002