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Amanda Leigh

Amanda Leigh
Amanda Leigh.png
Studio album by Mandy Moore
Released May 26, 2009 (US)
June 28, 2010 (Brazil)
November, 2011 (Argentina)
Recorded 2008–2009
Genre
Length 37:57
Label Storefront/RED Distribution
Producer
Mandy Moore chronology
Super Hits
(2007)
Amanda Leigh
(2009)
Singles from Amanda Leigh
  1. "I Could Break Your Heart Any Day of the Week"
    Released: April 1, 2009
Professional ratings
Review scores
Source Rating
Allmusic 3.5/5 stars link
Associated Press positive link
The Boston Globe positive link
The Dallas Morning News B+ link
Entertainment Weekly B+ link
The Hartford Courant positive link
IGN (7.4/10) link
Metromix 3/5 stars link
Rolling Stone 3.5/5 stars link
Slant Magazine 3.5/5 stars link

Amanda Leigh is the sixth studio album by American singer Mandy Moore, released by Storefront Recordings in May and June 2009. Marketed and distributed by Sony Music Entertainment, the album consists of eleven songs and five bonus tracks. Most are contemporary folk style songs with country and pop influences.

On March 17, 2009, "I Could Break Your Heart Any Day of the Week", the first single from the album, was released for digital download on iTunes.

In October 2008, Moore posted live videos of three new songs she had been working on with singer-songwriter, pianist and guitarist Mike Viola on her blog. Fans speculated about a possible album featuring both artists.

Recording sessions for the album took place around December 2008 in Boston, Massachusetts.

It was announced in February 2009 that the new album was to be released in May by Storefront Recordings, a new label founded by Moore's longtime manager John Leshay. Moore again worked with Lori McKenna, who co-wrote three songs on her 2007 album, Wild Hope.

The album's music variously channels Todd Rundgren, Joni Mitchell, and Paul McCartney. According to Moore, "The music is all a reflection of me now, not somebody else's choices."

The album opens with the song "Merrimack River", which, according to Moore, she knew it was exactly the way to open the album, indicating the lyrics ("restless to begin a wave comes crashing in"). The next song, "Fern Dell", was among the first batch of songs recorded for the album. The song, according to the singer talks about first impressions and how they can change and affect your world. The third track is "I Could Break Your Heart Any Day of the Week", which also served as the only official single released. About the song, Moore says "it's a way of owning and acknowledging your sense of worth in a rather tongue and cheek manner". The fourth song, "Pocket Philosopher", is about "the excitement of meeting someone new and wanting to stop time so you could figured them out a little more". The fifth song, "Song About Home" talks about the struggles that there might be between the definitions of home when you are a child and when you have your own family. "Everblue", the sixth song on the album, is the last survivor of the 6 or 7 songs written by Moore and Lori McKenna. The song, though being heavy, has a comfortable, resigned sadness. The seventh song, called "Merrimack River (Reprise)" is an instrumental interlude which resembles the first song of the album. "Love to Love Me Back", the eighth song of the album, is a country-oriented song which talks about loving and being loved back by someone who is capable of having "two way conversations" and someone who "can handle any situation". The song was also the first song written by Moore along with Mike Viola and Inara Georgre and it became "instant driving force in shaping what the record turned out to be". "Indian Summer", the ninth song is described by Moore as "the one song that carried severe demo-itis for me". The tenth song of the record ("Nothing Everything") was the last song written for it. The song is about telling someone that maybe it's time to move on and that you feel that the person deserves the best, and you are not it. According to Mandy, Viola was working on the melody for a few days, but the lyrics were written in fifteen minutes. The name of the last song of the record "Bug" came from Moore's nickname given by her husband, the singer Ryan Adams, and she describes it as "something acoustic and simple to fall at the end of the record".


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