If life were a buffet, Texas singer/songwriter Tricia Mitchell would want to taste every dish.  In a world that values getting right to the point, her life so far has been a rich and complicated maze of interests and experiences that have taken her throughout the United States.

Mitchell's long and winding resume includes having been a professional modern dancer, performing almost every job one could ever do in a restaurant (including telling a joke to Bruce Springsteen), driving a delivery truck for a bakery, working at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade, studying American History, coming very close to going to medical school, working at a law school, a brokerage firm, a software company, and a hospital, earning an MBA, surviving three New England winters, using hypnosis to birth two babies without painkillers, cultivating an entrepreneurial spirit, forming warm and juicy lifelong friendships, balancing work and life, studying the intricacies of the human heart, striving to maintain a bright and spunky light no matter what others may say or do, and last but not least, winning fans as a singer and songwriter.

Luckily, all of that richness manages to work its way into her music.

While her two young children have kept her close to home for the past several years, Mitchell has performed at festivals such as SXSW and the legendary Club Passim’s Cutting Edge of the Campfire, as well as in local venues and on radio.  Fellow Austinite Sara Hickman snagged two of the tunes from Purple Room for her most recent release, Motherlode .   A late bloomer, musically speaking, Mitchell has taken to heart the advice often given to young writers of literature:  live life first, and then write.  For the listener, it is worth the wait. 

If you have an appreciation for well-written songs and pristine production, you will love Tricia Mitchell's CD, Purple Room.  Smart, honest, and open-hearted, her music is a fusion of pop, folk, and country--like what you might get if you combine the earnest aching of Iris Dement, the softness of Alison Krauss, and the take-no-guff sass of Sheryl Crow.

Naming influences such as Elvis Costello, Ron Sexsmith, Bruce Springsteen, and Lucinda Williams, Mitchell describes her songs, “I strive for simple structure and catchy melodies, with lyrics that depict the strength in being and remaining emotionally vulnerable.”

Purple Room offers 12 solid, original tracks that span a depth and breadth of emotions, from the bold opening track, “For This;” to the light-hearted honky tonker “Never Say I Do,” about a confirmed bachelorette; to “Twenty Years to Life,” a somber ballad narrated by a victim of domestic violence who is imprisoned for murdering her husband.  A late bloomer, musically speaking, Mitchell has taken to heart the advice often given to young writers of literature: live life first, and then write.  For the listener, it is worth the wait. It’s refreshing to hear an album with so many great songs, so well done.