Folk 412 Items

Kate Bollinger's songs tend to linger well beyond their run times, filling the negative space of ordinary days with charming melodies and smart phrasings. She writes them at home in Richmond, Virginia, letting her subconscious lead, an open-ended process she likens to dreaming. From a chord progression appears a line, maybe a syllable will start to stick, enough to pursue, but she says sometimes the words don't feel likeher own, more like shapes that form in the mind's sky. Bollinger's musical universe is relaxed, tender, and unassuming; within lives a timeless sensibility, a songwriter's knack for noticing the little things and their counterpoints. Darkness and light, pain and pleasure, reality and escape. Her new EP, Look at it in the Light, her first project on Ghostly International, is collaborative; she shoots music videos with her friends and colors each of her folk-pop songs with musicians in her community. The title Look at it in the Light is a reference to the aspects of Bollinger's life that she knows need examining. For one, there's her persistent resistance to change _ she chooses to ignore it on the title track ("I try not to notice / I deny my fate"), as wiry strums sync with crisp drums. She surrenders to comfort on "Who Am I But Someone," a light and softly psychedelic number. "Yards / Gardens" finds Bollinger in full swing, skipping verses of uncertainty above a bright and nimble bassline and kick. Guitar riffs unravel across the bridge, trailing her lines like ellipses. The string-backed "Lady in the Darkest Hour" is the set's most luxuriant statement, recorded during a session at Matthew E. White's Spacebomb Studios with in-house arranger Trey Pollard (Natalie Prass, Helado Negro). Here her lines ring bittersweet yet reassuring, uplifted by swells of golden-hued instrumentation. From the hushed abstractions of "I Found Out" to the biting suspicions of closer "Connecting Dots," Kate Bollinger uses every inch of this dazzling EP to find her footing amidst the ever-present sways of life

for you who are the wronged is the much anticipated follow-up to 2018’s from when i wake the want is, and her 2014 debut bones you have thrown me and blood i’ve spilled, which won 2015’s Scottish Album of the Year award. If from when i wake… was written for love to return, this is where she fights tooth and claw to protect it.

Written and co-produced by Kathryn Joseph, it was recorded at The Lengths Studio in Fort William, with producer Lomond Campbell (also a recording artist for Heavenly Records and has previously produced King Creosote). Kathryn is signed to fellow Scottish musicians, Mogwai‘s Rock Action Records. It will appeal to those that have bought Kathryn’s earlier albums plus fans of Lana Del Ray, Laura Marling, Kate Bush, Aidan Moffat, and Erland Cooper.

Japanese pressing with OBI, with insert.