This came out in 2005 — or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):
Kids. They grow up so fast, don’t they?
Five years ago, Amanda Stott was just a teenage country-pop cutie, seemingly content to smile for the cameras and sing other people’s songs. Now she’s a young woman of 23, her musical taste has expanded and she wants to have more say in what she sings.
So, on her long-overdue sophomore disc Chasing The Sky, Stott trades in her cowboy boots and gingham dresses for the halter tops and fishnet stockings of a pop princess. And she puts more of herself into her music, co-penning about half these 11 tracks of earnest, soulful piano-pop.
All of that is fine. But what’s disappointing is that her sound is no more original than it was before. From the swelling ballads to the big-lunged choruses, there’s little here that you haven’t heard done before (and better) by the Sarahs and Chantals of the world.
“I swear I’m getting there,” promises Stott, and there’s no denying this disc is a step in the right direction. But there’s also no denying she still has a lot of growing up to do.
