The "DIRT" on Colleen Brown

by Malcolm Petch


Some non-stadium Canadian folk artists struggle to fill a 30-seat restaurant with a $5 cover charge. Then there are others like Colleen Brown, who put 300 butts into seats at St. Albert’s Arden Theatre at $25 a pop.

What makes the difference? What sets one so far apart from the other? Well, if I could tell you specifically, I’d be rich and famous as an indie-musician consultant. One thing I know for sure, though, is that Colleen Brown is very good: she’s a highly talented musician, she’s got an outstanding voice, and she writes fantastic songs. And her albums (three full-length ones to date) are very tastily produced. ‘Twould seem she’s got a lot going for her – and ‘twould seem that a lot of that lot has come as a result of a great deal of hard work on her part and a commitment to walk forward in the same direction no matter what happens.

Brown makes her home in Edmonton. She’s gonna love it here in Kelowna when she plays Streaming Café on March 31.

Brown’s climb upward seemed to pick up speed with the independent release in 2008 of her second album, Foot In Heart. Songs from the release found regular airplay slots on CBC, CKUA, and different college stations across the country. CBC liked her song ‘Love You Baby’ so much that it was featured on one of their Radio 2 TV commercials.


Others outside of the college circuit started taking notice, and Brown soon received an Alberta Emerging Artist Award, which of course brought her to even more people’s attention. Two full-length feature films (“Campus Radio” and “The Pharmacist”) had Colleen Brown songs placed in them.

It wasn’t long until Brown’s indie status was relegated to the archives; 2010 saw her Foot In Heart album re-released by Emm Gryner’s Dead Daisy Records and Outside Music, and Brown herself hit the road with a vengeance, playing festivals, concert halls, and clubs across the country. She played the 2010 Edmonton Folk Fest. She shared the stage with luminaries such as Don MacLean, Hannah Georgas, Brandi Carlisle, Hawksley Workman, Jim Cuddy, and Jakob Dylan.

And in October 2011 she toured across Canada with Crash Test Dummies.

How does one top a cross-country tour with CTD? One puts out a new album: October 2011 also marked the release of DIRT, Colleen’s third album of original material. Thirteen songs, including Fight! Fight! Fight!, winner of the New Music West 2011 Songwriting Award.

March 31 promises to be a special night at Streaming Café as we play host to Edmonton’s Colleen Brown. Links to her website, facebook, and twitter pages are on our ‘artists page’ page at www.streamingcafe.net, and less than 60 seconds of listening will be enough to convince you that Colleen Brown is an artist worth getting to know. You can do that in person here in Kelowna at 7pm Pacific on March 31, or you can join in online to listen and ask questions of the artist.