Marika Hackman | Big Sigh (2024) | Chrysalis
Profanity (SAFE HARBOR): 3, 7
Try: 2(!), 4, 5, 8(!), 9, 10(!)
This is the 5th full-length album from one of my favorite artists, Marika Hackman, a British musician whose debut was known for its nu-folk sound, akin to Joanna Newsom and Laura Marling, and whose stark departure in her second album likened her to PJ Harvey. Hackman has wandered a few roads in her musical career, though she always seems to find a middling path with moody, brooding, lustful, sad indie-folk & indie rock that is forceful in the way it appears under your skin. This album is heavily anchored in piano, though the guitar is Hackman’s mainstay and present on most tracks, often overlaid with piano, and some strings and brass on certain tracks. This was the “hardest album she’s had to make,” and that certainly shows. There’s familiar anxiety, desire, sounds, and chords from previous albums (We Slept At Last appears strong on tracks 3, 4, 5, 7, 9, 10, while I’m Not Your Man and Any Human Friend pop up in full force on tracks 2, 3, 8, & 9). Hackman has always had a preoccupation with bodily expulsions, actions, a dash of the grotesque in sexual desire, and that bleeds through in her songwriting, also laced through with female desire and friendship amidst a roiling pot of fear. Lovers, friends, and contemporaries of hers include The Japanese House, The Big Moon, Our Girl, and Art School Girlfriend. Track 6 is a piano instrumental. RIYL Fenne Lily, Laura Marling, This Is The Kit, Julia Jacklin, Samia, Aldous Harding – DC
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