Going out on your own as a solo artist/musician is a complicated process. It gives you the freedom to create exactly the kind of music you want, but at the same time, you really have to come up with something that stands out to be able to make a distinction among other such artists that are taking the same route. Doing it fully on your own through platforms like Bandcamp further complicates the process.
That makes things even more complicated for a singer-songwriter like Brooklyn’s Izzy Oram Brown, whose second full-length album, What I Want, should stand out. While her relatively brief debut Mess from 2022 might have gone relatively unnoticed, her 2025 EP Little Act did make waves through Bandcamp’s Rock For Sale’s Split EP series.
Both her previous releases showed ample talent and fully-grown musical ideas, all now further developed and nuanced on What I Want, with Oram Brown presenting herself as an incredibly talented songwriter who knows how to develop songs and envelop them in subtle, detailed arrangements that underline all the strengths of her songwriting and carefully and smartly subdued instrumental and vocal presentation, with Brown’s lyrics also shining throughout.
It is one of those albums that unveils its subtleties with every new play, making Izzy Oram Brown rightly stand close to the top of the current singer-songwriter crowd.
