Was it a Dream
By Marissa Nadler, from July (Sacred Bones/Bell Union) streaming here.
Boston's spectral songstress Marissa Nadler has released five albums, but it was last year's a cappella sirening to the wordless Game Of Thrones theme music that got her extra notice.
Now she is back with her new album July, a moodier thing than her past discs. The key track Was it a Dream finds the Poe-loving Nadler in haunted folk-waif form, hoping against hope that her hurtful behaviour never really happened – that it was a dream.
As her frozen fingers strum an acoustic guitar, Nadler insists in her textured-vocal way she has a "better half inside" and expresses hope that she will soon wake up to a less-sinister world.
In your dreams, Marissa Nadler, in your dreams.
Brad Wheeler