Single Review: Bryde - 'To Be Brave'

Photo cred: Sarah Howells & Jamie Ahye

Taken from her upcoming debut LP, Bryde’s new single ‘To Be Brave’ is considered a shock to the system of preconceived notions about her rock and roll style.

After setting up her label, Seahorse Music, to publish records by like-minded women in a male-dominated industry, Bryde has finished up her debut LP ‘Like An Island’. Her label aims to make female artists more visible in the industry. Her inimitable candid indie rock brand has been further realised with mixing help from Catherine Marks, who has worked with the likes of Wolf Alice, PJ Harvey and St Vincent, and mastering by Mandy Parnell.

The product of this is a single with poetic lyrics surrounding life and human interaction: intense internal poetry in everyday adversity. Bryde’s technical precision and vocal delivery of her lyrics resonate with a widening fanbase that can relate and find solitude in ‘To Be Brave’.

Bryde speaks of the song as being “a kind of soft squeeze of the hand to many friends who have, like me, been through many a dark period and put on a brave face and just got on with it. Its a comment about how we all live out certain episodes of out lives in such a public setting these days that I feel we almost edit them to appear flawless, nothing but smiles.”

‘Like An Island’ will be released on Seahorse Music on the 13th of April and will be available to preorder. Support from the Women Make Music fund from PRS has been award to assist its release. In April and May, Bryde will set off on her biggest UK, IRE and EU date tour so far with a show at London’s Omeara.

Review by Max Herridge