Dialtones

Anyone who has been to college will remember the local coffee shop guitar girl. Perhaps we see the stripped-stockings wearing girl around campus, and then one day we pass the local coffee shop or the student center and there she is, with her guitar and a microphone. All of the sudden we feel insight to this woman, now that we hear her melancholy and somewhat confessional lyrics. Her feminine and fairly vulnerable voice only add to this feeling. This woman will be playing her heart out on that acoustic guitar of hers, and you will be drawn in.

If that campus you were on happened to be the University of Maryland, that girl with the guitar might have been Acacia Sears. This, of course, is only if you were lucky, as this is not just any 'girl with a guitar,' but someone with more-than-average talent. This is the 'girl with a guitar' who might become “that girl playing at the club downtown” or “the girl opening for your favorite band” next year. Her first record, Dialtones, has been released on Sleepy Records, but it has all the charm and intimacy of hearing her play at the coffee shop that you remember so well. It would be hard to compare her to other artists without the cliché of comparing her to any and all guitar-toting ladies that came before her, but with the poetic qualities of an Ani DiFranco and the indie charm of a Ben Gibbard. She has potential for great things.

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