A Blog Interview: Tales From a Bar Stool
YouTube Video: Blues In The Night Live Cover
"Pouty Marlo is a soul from Vandaluse, a place just beyond the moon. Why the moon? Well, that's where the blues began, in Pouty land..."
Pouty Marlo is the blues-with-a-twist alter-ego of singer-songwriter Chantel Upshaw. She's a soul within a soul, whose ups and downs find her eventually as the 'empress of song'. In 2012, Chantel introduces this 'inner blues-mama-from-another-dimension'. She also debuts her first LP, True Tales from Vandaluse, that highlights a voice that is rich, emotive, and beautiful. As a teaser, Chantel will release a free digital download EP in February, featuring 5 new songs from the album.
Miss Upshaw’s real-life upbringing is just as fascinating as Pouty’s imagined one. A foster child from age 7 to 17, her foster dad was a Greek chef, who worked in logging camps in British Columbia for months at a time. Along with her two blood sisters, her foster parents had three older daughters. Her foster mom stayed with the girls, infusing the household with the Golden Oldies/Motown/pop sounds of the 1950s.
Miss Upshaw would often dream she was floating at the top of the classroom, singing to her classmates and they’d be loving it. As a teenager, the singer-pianist lived for a spell in Ontario, where she went through a rebellious stage and abandoned music. When she returned home to BC, she found her niche in musical theatre and its close-knit community.
But pop music allowed her to be herself, so she continued to express herself privately in song. She woodshedded for years, honing her songwriting skills, and demoing at home. Then, suddenly, a torrent of inspiration hit her from May to July of 2011, and a stream of songs came out in one big rush. She called upon Canadian producer Bill Bell (Jason Mraz, Justin Nozuka), with whom she had worked before on some demos, and expressed her desire to record them right away.
Though the album displays an undeniable penchant for soul music, miss Upshaw doesn’t see herself as a soul or R&B artist. “I’m impressionistic and I’m very experimental," she explains. "I love to improv very much, and I play around. Internally, I feel like something soulful was passed on to my voice, and I strongly connect to soul and the blues, but I draw from so much. A lot of the inspirations aren’t even musical.” — like Pouty Marlo, of course.
When Chantel sings “If you control the weather, then you’re gonna get a storm /And if you mess with fire, you’ll find out what fire is for,” on “The Weather,” one has to know that that is pure Pouty.