“It was culturally alive and it still is. There were a lot of block parties in the summer. They would import bands from Memphis and Mississippi and us brown and black girls would be jamming to these groups,” says Bette Smith, as she walks around the neighborhood of her upbringing, Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, NY.

She’s just back from the UK where she made her new album ‘Goodthing’ (July 12, 2024 / Kartel Music Group) with GRAMMY Award-winning producer Jimmy Hogarth (Amy Winehouse, James Blunt, James Bay, Anonhi & The Johnsons, Sia, Corinne Bailey Rae, Tina Turner). Hogarth attests, “Bette is the real deal. Her delivery is the truth and comes straight from the heart. She is able to communicate with ease with her wonderful gift of a voice and I was delighted to work on this record.”

Bette’s on the cusp of a new chapter, with an album that is poised to take over airwaves far and wide and seems sure to find her a much wider audience in the days to come.

Blessed with a voice described as “raspy,” “sassy,” “raunchy” and “sweet ’n soulful,” Bette grippingly fuses the soul, rock & roll, funk, blues, and gospel music she heard in her Brooklyn youth into something all her own. Yet, ‘Goodthing’ is no retro album.

MOJO called her “the next big-voiced soul sensation out of Brooklyn.” Of her success, she says, “It’s really a thank you God situation. It’s just been a whirlwind of meeting people from different places and countries.”

The young Bette Smith would have no idea that her music would take her around the world, from shows in America headlining and supporting the likes of Kenny Wayne Shepherd and the Drive-By Truckers to festivals in North America and Europe; from working with artists like Jimbo Mathus, Kirk Fletcher, Patterson Hood, and Matt Patton (of the Drive-By Truckers) to spotlights in the pages of The New York Times, Billboard, Paste, Bust, and beyond; from the airwaves of NPR World Café and the top 40 of the Americana Music Radio Chart to official Spotify playlist adds and a song streamed well over a million times.

The positivity, gratitude, and deep feeling of ‘Goodthing’—her musical high-water mark to date—are hard-earned by life experience.

She told NPR, of growing up in Bed-Stuy, “You had to stand up. I learned to be tough and to defend myself.” There was one instance where her brother came home saying there were kids trying to jump him and their dad had to chase them off with a two by four.

She recalls hearing a lot of soul music on the radio and in the neighborhood, saying, “When you were walking down the street, if you were humming any non-African American singer, you could get beat up!”

Her first stage was in church, taking solos with the church choir on songs like “Beautiful Flowers” or selections by Mahalia Jackson. “That’s my roots! Church music, Negro spirituals that they sang on special occasions. That was what I sank my teabag into,” she remembers.

In fact, her mother once beat her for singing secular music. Yet music of all kinds continued to serve as a balm for Bette. “It was a way of me soothing myself. If I was alone, I would sing and hum. Music was always a part of me,” say says.

This remained the case as she moved into adulthood. Bette’s brother Louis, aka Junior, on his deathbed from kidney disease, asked her to sing. “I was dancing around his bed, trying my best to cheer him up. He had a do-not-resuscitate order so it was extremely sad circumstances.” She serenaded him with Bill Withers, Otis Redding, Aretha Franklin, and Gladys Knight & the Pips, all his favorite songs. Weeks before his passing, he told her, “Promise me that you’ll sing, that you’ll follow your true heart.”

To this day, she dedicates her music and her concerts to Louis’ memory.

She also wants to pass on those feelings of gratitude and message of staying true to oneself to her fans. “It’s all about inspiring. I want everyone to be OK. I just want the world to heal itself,” she says.