Michelle Branch Wows Fans, Twitter Nation on Webcast

On Monday night, singer-songwriter Michelle Branch completed a special U-Stream webcast for her fans and by the end of the night, many denizens of the Twitter universe. Branch ran through a slew of old songs and busted out some new ones in an effort to promote her new album "Everything Comes and Goes" which will be released on November 10^th.

Along the way, the massive amount of Tweets used during the chat function causing her hashtag (#MichelleBranch) to rise all the way up to number eight on the trending topics chart. Other Twitter users who hadn't heard from Branch in quite a while were jumping into the webcast by the end of night, just in time for Branch to play one of her most well known tunes "Everywhere".

Branch, a pop star with hits such as "Everywhere", "Breathe", "All You Wanted" and "Are You Happy Now?" rebuilt her career as part of a country duo (along with Jessica Harp) known as The Wreckers. Although record label execs were skeptical, together they had a #1 hit "Leave the Pieces" and released a Live DVD set. Just as quickly s they shot up the charts, Branch and Harp decided to call it quits. After taking some time to think about her next steps, Branch realized she wanted to continue onwards, once again recording an album on her own terms.

Among the new material played was "Sweet Ride", an ode to her four year old daughter Owen which was indeed very sweet, as well as the uptempo and slick lead single "Sooner or Later".

It's a nice plain set up for the stream, just Michelle in a hotel somewhere in Los Angeles, guitar in hand (a white Gibson hummingbird, which according to Michelle is "one of the coolest guitars I have and you'll probably be seeing it a lot more"). It was a plain Jane environment, yet appropriate enough for such an intimate and personal outreach to her fan base.

Although Branch initially seemed nervous and unsure about this whole webcast experiment thing, she soon found her way, freely interacting with the web chat, answer fan questions both serious and silly-one out there question: if there was a sushi named for her, what would be in it?

Branch cut some songs short either because she didn't remember certain lyrics or guitar parts (some songs having not been played for years), but there were a few rarities, including Branch playing the first ever song she wrote-"Fallen" as well as busting out a few bars of Neil Young--the first ever artist she learned to play on guitar.

"I'd Rather Be in Love" and a plucky rendition of "All You Wanted" were also highlights of the set.

By the end of the night Michelle Branch demonstrated the power of the tweet with those not even aware of the chat gaining knowledge and discussing her. Overall, this night turned out not a bad decision by Branch and her people to use this forum to get the word out about her new album.

Branch plays City Winery in New York City on Wednesday September 30^th as a preview of her new material.