Holly Drummond

Smoothiesforme is a talented 17 year-old singer songwriter from Edinburgh. In 2010, she made it through to the finals of The Forth One To Watch Awards, and her self-penned and produced songs have gone on to win her acclaim and fans alike.

New Beginnings is a free-to-download EP, serving as a taster for her full Road To Happiness album – but also as an appetising product in its own right.

Smoothiesforme’s vocals have a vulnerable delicacy to them; a breathiness and tremulous quality which is both distinctive and mature. This is ably demonstrated on EP opener Forbidden, a deep and enveloping production spun with plucked arpeggio guitar wrapped warmly in sweeping strings, creating a subtle track which swells and ebbs like the ocean on a moonlit night.

“There is a road to happiness, we just haven’t found it yet,” she sings, summing up the melancholic lyrical themes on offer on New Beginnings: tales of love lost all too quickly, yet with a sense of optimism and self-belief driving them forward.

Will This Ever End? Is poppier and more upbeat, featuring a keyboard refrain which shoots through the track, giving it an energy and mood completely different to Forbidden. Smoothiesforme’s vocal delivery is the same however: understated and fragile, yet with an undertone of strength which results in a unique and compelling whole. An ambient remix of the song is also included, giving the original much more space to move, like a dancer alone in an empty ballroom just after midnight.

Like A Fool is perhaps the standout track on offer here: with its haunting guitar and moody, claustrophobic production, it begins in atmospheric style before slipping into a shuffling rhythm as it builds in intensity like a slow-burning flame. By the end, only the ashes of Like A Fool are left, but its powerful imprint remains, seared into your memory.

Into His Arms wears its beautiful melancholic heart on its sleeve, the guitar and strings underscoring a mesmerising song of broken-hearted loss and betrayal.

“You are nothing without me,” she sings on the final song Wreckage, which sums up this talented singer’s attitude perfectly: a new, independent voice which will make you sit up and take notice with its confidence and strength as much as for its youth.

Smoothiesforme is most definitely One To Watch: but above all, one to listen to and follow as she journeys from these new beginnings into a future which looks set to be bright for her indeed. - Edinburgh Spotlight

The subtle but silky guitar notes slithered down my eardrum and registered as simplistic brilliance in a box of gems. Smoothiesforme, promoting the fact that her music is refreshing and smooth, breaking the barrier that exsists among mainstream bands and artists. - Independent Music News