All songs written by Elisabeth Cutler
P & C 2015 Hole in The Donut Music (BMI) /sub-published by Beste! Uterhaltung
Produced & arranged by Filippo De Laura
Recorded and edited by Filippo De Laura at Telepe Studio, Rome, Italy
Drums and percussion recorded and edited by Eugenio Vatta at Oneemusic Studio, Rome
Mixed by Eugenio Vatta and Filippo De Laura at E45 Studio and Oneemusic Studio, Rome
Mastered by Eugenio Vatta at Oneemusic Studio, Rome
Photography by Bee&Gio, Filippo, Elisabeth
Stylists: Ernesto Biagetti & Mauri Menga
Artwork by Rita Giacalone – Bitbazar, Roma

Elisabeth plays and loves Ken Parker Guitars, Fishman Transducers, D’Addario Strings
Filippo De Laura plays with great joy the Chapman Stick
Mats Hedberg uses exclusively: Engl Amps, True Temperament fretting system, Manne Guitars, Ramirez Classical guitars, EBow, Kor Pedals, Vignoni Handmade Pickups, The Rock Slide, Essetipicks, Ernie Ball Strings
Massimo Cusato is a Remo artist and plays Ufip cymbals

 

Polishing Stones | I am Love | Song of Solitude | Make a Love | I Found You | It’s Never Too Late | Reunion | Across Your Heart | In Your Hands | Nothing But Love | Anyone But You

 

Polishing Stones

Come to me with an open mind
Empty your heart then look into my eyes
Far beyond the shadows of doubt
Long lost lovers who broke your heart
I am not one

I’ve been on my own
Upstairs in my room
Polishing stones
Slowly I roll them
Over and over in my hands
Like a woman and a man
Love comes with time
Patience is wise

My heart has eyes of its’ own
It goes where it wants to go
With or without me
The same story keeps repeating
Again I try to change the ending

But I’m still on my own
Upstairs in my room
Polishing stones
Slowly I roll them
Over and over in my hands
Like a woman and a man
Love comes with time
Patience is wise
Patience is wise
Patience is wise
Patience is wise

Elisabeth: acoustic guitar, vocal
Filippo De Laura: chapman stick
Massimo Cusato: bodhran, tar drum, shaker, cymbal, triangle
Mats Hedberg: acoustic guitar, ebow
Ernesto Cossío: Spanish guitar

 

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I am Love

Some days I’m getting nowhere
Searching a four-leaf clover
You come around the corner
You’re not the one I must remember

I am Love, I am Love, I am Love
An’ I’m looking for a heart to open tonight
I am Love
I am Love

Somewhere inside the emptiness
There’s music in the silence
After the storm of sadness
Here comes the sun of happiness

I am Love, I am Love, I am Love
An’ I’m looking for a heart to open
looking for a heart to hold me tonight
I am Love
I am Love

I’m looking for a heart to open
Lookin’ for a heart to hold me
lookin’ for a heart to find me tonight, tonight
I’m lookin’ for a heart to love me tonight
I am Love
I am Love

Elisabeth: acoustic guitar, vocal
Filippo De Laura: Chapman Stick, kalimba, vocals
Massimo Cusato: drums, conga, djembe, chimes
Mats Hedberg: electric guitar, Wah-wah

 

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Song of Solitude

Lay down
Be quiet now
All the things you want will find you
Slow down, look around
Someone’s waiting when you’re ready

But not now
Calm down
Listen to the song of solitude
Go down and you’ll find out
Love is hiding deep inside of you
An’ love will come to renew you

Lay down
Be quiet now
Let the river run through you
Take time out, have no doubt
Love is close an’ watching over you
An’ love will come to renew you

Lay down
Be quiet now

Elisabeth: acoustic guitar, vocal
Filippo De Laura: Chapman Stick, wooden piccolo
Massimo Cusato: drums
Ernesto Cossío: Spanish guitar

 

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Make a Love

I dream what I feel
I want what I fear
I know what I need
Everything you do to me

Passion is a chemical reaction
It happens with no reason
I follow the Law of Attraction
Is it wrong to fall in love

Diamonds in your eyes
Roses on my lips
Promises from the heart
Make a love that never stops
Make a love that never stops

There’s a rising in dependency
It comes from a natural chemistry
You can stop a woman’s heart
So take care with what you start

Diamonds in your eyes
Roses on my lips
Promises from the heart
Make a Love that never stops
Make a Love that never stops

Elisabeth: acoustic guitar, vocal
Filippo De Laura: bass
Massimo Cusato: drums
Mats Hedberg: electric guitar, Wah-wah
Ernesto Cossío: Spanish guitar
Liquid Groove: loop

 

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I Found You

I ask you if you’re going away
You come back but will you stay
I’m trying to ride out this wave

You gotta go when the spirit calls
A wildflower won’t last long
A bird in your hands then I’m gone

I’ve been searching for the perfect rhyme
It’s not easy to find
The right word at the right time
Then I found you
I found you

If it’s true Jesus is Love
I’m calling all his angels for help
Help us learn to love

Take it slow and make it last
Go with the flow, release the past
Open the seed of love

My heart’s racin’ I’m on fire
I’m walkin’ on the highwire
I’m fallin’ fast, closin’ my eyes
Then I found you
I found you

Play me a melody
I’ll sing a harmony
You can be free with me

We’ll make it up as we go
In the future no one knows
How long will this song go on
‘Til I find you
I found you
I found you

Elisabeth: acoustic guitar, vocal
Filippo De Laura: bass, Akkord Zither
Massimo Cusato: drums, shaker
Mats Hedberg: electric guitar delay, EBow

 

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It’s Never Too Late

Today’s my wedding day
I’ve waited for this day to be free
No more worries
‘Bout nobody lovin’ me

Take off your walkin’ shoes
Lay down and let me love you
Right now
An’ forever too

We’ll make a lot of promises
We won’t break
We’ll split it down the middle
When we cut the cake

It’s never too late
It’s never too late
It’s never too late
It’s never too late
It’s never too late

Elisabeth: acoustic guitar, vocal
Filippo De Laura: Chapman Stick, fusion-tar
Massimo Cusato: drums, dholla, darbuka, shaker
Mats Hedberg: acoustic guitar

 

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Reunion

You are the darkness under my skin
You are the softness I’m longing
You are the danger I’m risking
You are the beauty I’m seeking

All I am is human
All I want is reunion

I am the way to your heart
I am your last chance stop
I am your wish out of your reach
I am the promise you couldn’t keep

All you are is human
All you want is reunion

We are walking with our fathers
We are asking why to our mothers
We are embracing our brothers
We are crying with our sisters

We are all human
All we want is reunion

You are the darkness under my skin
You are the softness I’m longing

Elisabeth: acoustic guitar, vocal
Filippo De Laura: bass, acoustic guitar, mandolin, bouzuki, Mohan Veena
Massimo Cusato: drums
Mats Hedberg: electric guitar, EBow
Ernesto Cossío: Spanish guitar

 

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Across Your Heart

False starts
Broken hearts
Lookin’ for a new beginning
Blind dates
Late-night bars
Another dead ending
Nothing is impossible
But it might take a miracle

I didn’t see you comin’
But here you are
Now I’m falling like a star
Across your heart
I’m a falling star
Into your arms
Across your heart
Across your heart

Zodiac
An’ tarot cards
Can’t tell me who you are
Eight balls
An’ ouji boards
Send a message up to god
Anything is possible
A wish becomes a miracle

I didn’t see you comin’
But here you are
Now I’m falling like a star
Across your heart
I’m a falling star
Into your arms
Across your heart
Across your heart

Life is unpredictable
Our love is a miracle

I didn’t see you comin’
But here you are
Now I’m falling like a star
Across your heart
I’m a falling star
Into your arms
Across your heart
Across your heart
Across your heart
Across your heart

Elisabeth: acoustic guitar, vocal
Filippo De Laura: Chapman Stick, bass, fusion-tar, dholla
Massimo Cusato: drums, brushes
Mats Hedberg: electric guitar, acoustic guitar, slide

 

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In Your Hands

It’s so easy to start
A fire lights with a spark
it’s so hard to stop
Your fingers are like a gentle rain
Falling on my skin
I open in your hands

I’m gonna take a chance
To embrace this romance
Like the ocean moves the sand
A wave is rising deep inside me
Bringing up a longing
For love in your hands

I’m letting down my hair
In your hands
I’m spreading my pretty wings and flying
Into your hands

I wanna be the one
To laugh and have fun
To live in the land of love
I’m falling like a leaf outside
your window in the sun
I land in your hands
In your hands
In your hands

Elisabeth: acoustic guitar, vocal
Filippo De Laura: Glissentar
Massimo Cusato: drums, conga, djembe, chimes
Ernesto Cossío: Spanish guitar

 

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Nothing But Love

If you were standing in front of me now
You’d be the earth holding me up
Steady and strong

Every night when the sun goes down
I’ll be your moon turning around you
Silently and slowly

If I tell you what I want
Will you take me in your arms
Then you’ll see what’s inside my heart
Nothing but love, nothing but love
Nothing but love, nothing but love

There’s an island in the middle of me
If you’re a lonely ship lost at sea
I will harbor thee

Far away in your eyes
Clouds are gathering
Tears are falling from my sky
Oh why

Do I give you more than you want
Shall I take this burden from your arms
Then we’ll see what’s inside our hearts
Nothing but love, nothing but love
Nothing but love, nothing but love

Elisabeth: acoustic guitar, vocal
Ernesto Cossío: mohan veena
Massimo Cusato: udu, shakers, chimes, spring drum
Filippo De Laura: vibratone

 

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Anyone But You

I closed the blinds and went inside
To listen to the silence
I stood between my heart and mind
And watched you from a distance

Anyone but you would do
Anyone but you
I need somebody new
Who’s not you

I knew it from the start
I should stop my heart
I thought I could control
How far I would fall

But there’s no one like you
There’s no one like you
Who makes me feel
The way you do

I don’t want anyone but you
I don’t want anyone but you
I don’t need anyone but you

I’ll change the sheets and change my thoughts
I’ll turn the clocks ahead
I’ll make some plans to travel
To some far-away land

But anywhere I go there’s you
Everywhere I go
I already know
There’ll be you

You said, “I love you”
Then you said it again
I didn’t know that it was love
When I was fallin’

Anyone but me could see
That anyone but you
Would be the best thing
I could do

To find anyone but you
I’ll take anyone but you
Send me anyone but you

Elisabeth: acoustic guitar, vocal
Recorded live in Telepe Studio

 21 aprile 2015 release on youtube:

‘Elisabeth Cutler – an American artist in Europe’

(subtitles Italian)

 

 

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Pure Faszination – Musenblätter, Das Magazin für Kultur und Reise – Franck Becker – 2015 March

Sie selbst gehört mit Sicherheit schon jetzt zu den besten Künstlerinnen ihres Genres überhaupt. Vom ersten Akkord des Openers/Titelsongs an ist man von der faszinierenden Stimme und dem sehnsuchtsvollen Gitarrenspiel Elisabeth Cutlers rettungslos gefesselt – Apropos Rita Coolidge: wie die unvergessene große Country-Lady serviert Miss Cutler allerhöchst gepflegten Country-Pop, das warme, dunkle Timbre recht ähnlich, die Botschaften der Songs ebenso. Auch die Songs von „Polishing Stones“ haben durch die genannten Qualitäten und das Charisma Elisabeth Cutlers das Zeug, die Zeit zu überdauern. Dieses außergewöhnlich berührende Album wird unsere Schallplatte der Woche und hat unsere Auszeichnung verdient, den Musenkuß.

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Akustik Gitarre – Jens Hausmann (Stefan Woldach) – 2015 April

Polishing Stones (Beste! Unterhaltung) Ihr interessanter Stil-Mix aus Folk, Jazz und Pop lässt eine gut sortierte Ptattensammtung vermuten, schon die charismatische Stimme erinnert an Joni Mitchell, Norah Jones oder Diana Krall. und die Songstrukturen folgen den Rezepten bester

Singer/Songwriter-Tradition mit geschmackvotlen Jazz-Akkorden, pikant abgeschmeckt mit

europäischer Weltmusik und einem Hauch Sting. Kein Wunder, die WahLheimat der amerikanischen

Künstlerin ist Rom. Gut eingelebt arbeitet sie dort mit meist italienischen Künstlern und veröffentlicht sporadisch Alben, dies ist die sechste Scheibe seit 1993. In den lyrischen Texten geht es natürlich vor allem um ,,Amore” im weiteren Sjnne: Die Serpentinen des Lebens und der Liebe sind gemeinsame Nenner und universeller Rahmen zugleich. Mit ausgeprägtem Sinn für bitter-süße Melancholie irgendwo zwischen den Polen von verzweifelter Einsamkeit und sehnsuchtsvoll romantischer Liebe wickelt uns die elegante Dame mjt sehr persönlichen Songs um den Finger. Auch wenn es in dem 0hrwurm-verdächtigen TitelSong um polierte Steine geht, schürft die djskrete Poetin nicht tiefer nach Botschaften und verrät auch keine Geheimnisse. Das würde nur von den wundervollen Arrangements ablenken. die in kleiner Besetzung mit Perkussion, diversen Gitarristen und Filippo De Laura am Chapman Stick kristallklar eingespielt wurden. Auch das Gitarrenspiel der Ken Parker Endorserin selbst ist sehr versiert und Filippo sammelt zudem seine Credits ats Arrangeur, Produzent und für das Recording. Die zauberhaft polierten Akustiksongs machen dem TjteI alle Ehre, aber irgendwie stellt sich eher eine kühI erfrischend nordische Fjord-Stimmung ein, als daß man die Produktion im mediterranen Klima verorten möchte. Aber wenn auch, eine clever gemachte Easy-Listening Platte zum entspannten Abschalten und Kraftschöpfen ist es alle Ma. Im besten Sinne.

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Musicamag – Alessandro Hellman – 2015 April

E’ un percorso del tutto autonomo ed inusuale quello della cantautrice statunitense Elisabeth Cutler. Nata e cresciuta a Boston, ha scelto, dopo una parentesi nashvilliana, come patria adottiva l’Italia e da ormai una decade porta in giro per il vecchio continente il suo raffinatissimo pop acustico, costruito con meticolosità e intelligenza ed estraneo ai cliché di genere. Il suo nuovo album, “Polishing Stones”, prodotto da Filippo De Laura per la tedesca Beste Unterhaltung, è una raccolta di canzoni che ruotano intorno ai temi eterni dell’amore e di una solitudine che non è deriva o abbandono, ma, piuttosto, consapevolezza e attesa. Un disco ricco di melodie nitide, mai appariscenti, servite con misurata grazia, capace di affascinare e rivelarsi a poco a poco, confidando sottovoce un nuovo segreto ad ogni ascolto. – Elisabeth Cutler, “Polishing Stones” (Beste Unterhaltung, 2015)

La recensione è online su www.musicamag.com

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www.mescalina.it – Laura Bianchi – 2015 April

Da anni Elisabeth Cutler, americana di Boston, con trascorsi a Nashville e ora italiana di adozione, sperimenta in diversi territori musicali; esperta conoscitrice degli strumenti (ha infatti iniziato a farsi strada nell`ambiente come restauratrice), valida chitarrista, scrittrice di poesie in musica, ha percorso strade che si intrecciano fra loro, e l`hanno portata ad un mix sapiente di sonorità, che spaziano dal songwriting di Joni Mitchell e Shawn Phillips fino al soul di Stevie Wonder, passando per l`apprezzamento per chitarristi jazz come Ralph Towner e il brasiliano Egberto Gismonti.

Il nuovo lavoro, Polishing Stones, il primo dal 2009, il sesto della sua lunga carriera, registrato interamente a Roma, rappresenta un passo avanti nell`evoluzione di un`artista, che non ha fretta di produrre dischi, ma che cerca, in ognuno di essi, di segnare una tappa importante in un percorso umano e musicale. Il musicista Filippo De Laura, con doppia residenza a Roma e New York, ha dato il giusto tocco internazionale e insieme mediterraneo alla produzione di un disco di facilissimo ascolto, eppure non commerciale nel senso letterale del termine.

Influssi della West Coast si mescolano a quelli delle songstresses più acclamate di ogni tempo, dalla Mitchell fino a Norah Jones, con piacevoli tocchi jazzy dello Sting di Nothing Like the Sun, per ascoltatori dal tempo lento, che cercano un adult easy listening di classe, con testi introspettivi il giusto, e qualche perla rara, come You are the darkness under my skin / You are the softness I‘m longing (frase che apre Reunion), oppure Everywhere I go, I already know, there`ll be you (Anyone but you).

E, se tanto parlare di pene d`amore, sentimenti soffusi e introspezione a qualcuno può risultare stucchevole, la Cutler prosegue per la propria strada: lei si rivolge a quanti, in una canzone, cercano esattamente il colore dell`anima, che per lei ha un suono: quello di una chitarra e della sua voce.

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Glitterhouse mail order house – Joe Whirlypop – 2015 March

Ausgereift und erwachsen sind Sound und Songs ganz zweifellos, und ihre Stimme ist wirklich außergewöhnlich. Im weiteren Verlauf ihres bereits sechsten Albums wird ihr Sound eher folky, mit luftigen Drums – zum Glück gerät das Album dann aber nicht allzu betulich. Geschmackvoll und reif, ist „Polishing Stones“ letztlich ein Album geworden, wie man es so in den letzten gut 30 Jahren kaum mehr gehört hat.