Every time Marissa Nadler’s voice and the ethereal halo of instruments surrounding her enter the room, it pulls you into a world of entrancing story. For the last two decades, the Massachusetts songwriter has had this uncanny ability to beautify the most haunting parts of our real life through soft, glowing reveries that reside in an altered plane floating somewhere between traditional folkwork and dream-pop siren calls. New Radiations, her 10th studio album, is something of a return to foundational form as much as it is a reincarnation for Nadler’s work, however. Self-produced and mixed by Randall Dunn (Earth, Sunn O)))) as well as featuring a classic black and white Sacred Bones artwork layout on its cover, her latest is a fete of her singular longevity that also arrives right on time to peak into autumn’s dying days with its many specters born from relationships fictionalized and not.

Through her wandering gaze and relying on the simple strength of crafting timeless, stripped acoustic balladry, this is the quintessential Marissa Nadler songbook, brim full of murderess love stories, cosmic dalliances with fate, and dimensional-breaking escapes séanced to this earth by way of woozy slide guitars, transfiguring synths, and just a touch of black metal psychedelia. Though today’s listening culture oft ignores the quieted spirited, New Radiations‘ humble energy spins the senses into weaving its songs into your own specific memory. The way the music sounds and her reverberating voice carries into the air might remind you of a dark season, place, or even a person in your life, even if you’ve only seen their face in your dreams. It’s a stasis of ethereal folk that transports you right into Nadler’s supernatural world where the music can’t be heard without her former ghosts coming back to life.

Highlights: “It Hits Harder”, “New Radiations”, “Hatchet Man”

Marissa Nadler’s New Radiations is available now on Sacred Bones Records / Bella Union.

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