This month, Dallas, Texas-based Kimia Penton is releasing her new EP Lessons From Life and Love in which she examines, with emotions ranging from melancholy to joy, the various things adulthood can teach. Kimia Penton takes care of the main vocals and violin and gets help from Wes Stephenson on bass, Leslie Williams Blum on the piano, Kelyn Crapp on the guitar, and Francis Moka takes care of the percussion.
Most of her tracks are quite familiar to fans of adult contemporary music and would do well on such radio stations. Hope and despair flirt with one another in “The Door”, a song about developing a deep and intimate relationship. This flirting captures the fear and beauty of connecting with another soul. Aptly enough, the melody, played on a piano that confidently leads the track, is gentle and melancholic at times while becoming dynamic and full at others.
There is something pop country-like in the down-tempo, gentle, and heartwrenching “Crossroads” and “Start Again”. The toe-tapping beat of the mid-tempo, guitar-led “Memories of You” is quite catchy and gives a hopeful look at the aftermaths of the breakup of a relationship. The fact that there is only a guitar and percussion in this song brings Penton’s vocals to the forefront.
The two other offerings on this EP are slightly more exotic-sounding. The guitar ballad “My Kind of Love”, which welcomes listeners, does well to introduce Penton’s talented singing. It has a heartbeat-like rhythm to it and builds up in chunks; the first simple part is added to en masse when it transitions to a second verse that suddenly has a few more elements. A similar structure differentiates the third verse from the rest of the track. The violin solo, a little over the halfway mark, does well to introduce Penton’s skills on said instrument.
A certain dollop of exoticism is added to “Pieces” in the form of a Flamenco-inspired sound, the intonations and complexity of which is reflected in Penton’s vocals.
The heartfelt six tracks that form Lessons From Life and Love will appeal to adult contemporary music listeners. Tracks are available for streaming on SoundCloud. More information about Kimia Penton is available on her Facebook page.
Pictures provided by Independent Music Promotions.
First published on Blogcritics.