Lillie Ruth Bussey - Truthful Little Dittes

Lillie Ruth Bussey’s Truthful Little Ditties (earSnake, 2008) is a love story soundtrack waiting to happen. Written into the script of this prismatic collection of 14 songs are scenes of love, heartache, and lust, with an underlying urban sensibility inspired by the experiences of Lillie Ruth’s life in Philadelphia and Brooklyn. Known off-stage as Bianka Brunson and on-stage as her grandmother’s namesake, Bussey conducts her lo-fi symphony with vibrant synth arrangements, stripped down ukulele and acoustic guitar lines, and a gallery of homemade toys and noisemakers, creating a sound that is both experimental and accessible. Brunson’s most stunning homespun instrument is her voice, whose delicate vibrato floats like a hummingbird, capturing the warmth and vulnerability of being in love. To really see Truthful Little Ditties in Technicolor and Lillie Ruth’s artistic imagination at work, you have to see her live performance, where she pulls on the audience’s heartstrings one minute with the beautifully melancholy “Heart You Protect”, followed by a choreographed version of “Yo-Yo” and impromptu dance party the next. Whether listening at home, live, (or hopefully one day on screen), Truthful Little Ditties is one indie music box you’ll want to wind up again and again

Bianka Allyon Brunson is Lillie Ruth Bussey. Actually, Bussey was Brunson's maternal grandmother, but it's under her name that Brunson lovingly creates and performs quirky folk-pop. Brunson thinks the songs befit her grandmother's spirit, and that she'd enjoy them if she were alive today. Thus the name. And really, you'd have to be some sort of monster not to enjoy such warm-hearted, homespun tunes.

Taking up simple instruments and what sound like toys, Brunson delivers her aptly titled new album Truthful Little Ditties so sweetly and honestly that it feels like a grade-school valentine. As she dresses up her voice in echoes over a gently plunking keyboard melody and beat on "Here We Are," she recalls fellow Philly home-taper Tickley Feather--at least until she starts whistling and humming. "Doors Locked" is similarly sparse, but this time Brunson's dulcet singing is unadorned and all the better for it.

Built on a dainty ukulele and a sputtering beat, "Heart You Protect" is another wistful yet light-stepping number, sneaking in a kazoo for good measure. Like other songs of Brunson's, it's all about love, or in this case "this love you gave away."

Truthful Little Ditties marks the latest release from Philly's newish label/collective earSnake, and Brunson's CD-release show will double as a release show for labelmate Gemini Wolf's new single. Billed as an earSnake Jamboree, it's a rare chance to see three bands (and a DJ) that sound completely different from each other but have bonded --thanks to earSnake--in the midst of our city's increasingly crowded music scene.