During Brittney Spencer‘s NPR Tiny Desk Concert debut, the Baltimore-born musician delivered the first-ever live performance of “The Last Time,” a deep cut from her debut album My Stupid Life. As she explained mid-way through her six-song set, the song emerged from a conversation about the rarity of love songs in her writing catalogue. It’s often in those moments, when she leans into the creative acts she avoids, that Spencer finds breakthroughs.
“This album, I feel like it really cracked me wide open and it made me be a little more honest,” Spencer explained about the album. “And now when I look back, ‘I’m like why were you so nervous? You didn’t even saying nothing embarrassingly revealing.’”
All six songs from her Tiny Desk set appear on My Stupid Life, including “Bigger Than the Song,” “If You Say So,” “Night In,” “My First Rodeo,” and “I Got Time.” Spencer was joined for the performance by vocalist Abbey Cone, vocalist and drummer Jordan West, vocalist and guitarist Omri Skop, vocalist and bassist John McNally, and vocalist and keyboardist Martin “Harrison” Finks.
Spencer released My Stupid Life in January, just over two months before she would appear alongside Reyna Roberts, Tanner Adell, and Tiera Kennedy on “Blackbiird,” a deep cut on Beyoncé’s country opus Cowboy Carter.
Looking ahead at her next record, Spencer explains: “My writing has since then changed. I’m talking about all kinds of stuff now and I can’t wait to be able to put out new music.”
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The musician’s Tiny Desk debut arrives during Black Music Month, for which NPR has scheduled a stretch of performances from nine Black women. Spencer’s appearance follows sets from Tems, Lakecia Benjamin, Tierra Whack, Chaka Khan, and Kierra Sheard.
