A sublime, 70s California-style, Karen Carpenter-evoking, melancholy new work by Natalie Mering, her fifth LP overall, and first since the acclaimed Titanic Rising of 2019, one that’s “feeling around in the dark for meaning in a time of instability and irrevocable change”. Titanic Rising, she says, was “the first album of three in a special trilogy. It was an observation of things to come, the feelings of impending doom. And in the Darkness, Hearts Aglow is about entering the next phase, the one in which we all find ourselves today — we are literally in the thick of it … Looking for embers where fire used to be. Seeking freedom from algorithms and a destiny of repetitive loops.”
But all the doom there is an undeniable beauty, as well as dark humour. It’s Not Just Me, It’s Everybody, we picture her at a party feeling isolated, but meditating how those same private feeling are ironically universal. Written with Ben Babbitt and Jonathan Rado, and adding Mary Lattimore on harp, the song is decorated with swooning strings and piano and set the tones for the entire record. The video features an evil, people-killing mobile phone. On the sunnier sounding, more upbeat, later track, The Worst Is One, she glides inexorably into the line “I think it’s only just begun”. Whatever the prospects of our chaotic, dysfunctional, doomed world, Mering paints it with gorgeous melodies from first to last, shimmering strings, and perfectly weighted chord changes. It’s hard to find any songs here that aren’t standouts, but among these are Grapevine, Children of the Empire, the rippling sounds the natural world on God Turn Me Into A Flower, Hearts Aglow and A Given Thing. An album of the year contender, Mering is surely one of the greatest songwriters alive – with the purest of voices to match. Out on Sub Pop.
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