Vanessa Boyd: Pleasant Stay Hotel Released on vinyl and digital mediums Trance Americana – Appalachia meets NYC NY, NY Feb 11, 2009 Side A (Tracks 1-5): Trance Americana is the sound that Vanessa Boyd is producing on Pleasant Stay Hotel with a combination and flow of the traditional Moroccan hajhuj, synthesizer, singing bowl, tambourine, drums and vocals, electrified and run through effects. An electro-acoustic integration of elements of Sufi, Gnawa and psychedelic trance rhythms with folk and Americana melodies and stylings. Side B (Tracks 6-16): Spoken Word musings, assertions and reactions to the world around her, Vanessa Boyd is blunt and whimsical at the same time. These selections represent the struggle of living in a dominator culture, especially when it concerns being a woman. Vanessa Boyd has released two albums, Hunger in 2007 and the 2004 Unkept Woman, which have been featured and played on radio stations and podcasts up and down the US East Coast and select foreign stations. She has been regularly gigging across the US for nearly 10 years and now lives and performs in New York City. She is a headlining Spoken Word performer and a represented visual artist with sold work. Visit her website to see and hear it all. “Vanessa Boyd is a certified star in my book – she has an amazingly strong voice akin to the great Janis Joplin and the pedal effects she employed with her ukulele created an ethereal, otherworldly sound. Boyd has a great stage presence – which can cause even the most cynical hipster to pay attention to her.” –William Ruben Helms, Ins & Outs Magazine, NY Dec 08 # # #