Saturday, December 14, 2019

Angel Olsen - All Mirrors

Enormous, and at the same time delicate. All Mirrors is outstanding, probably her best yet, and both of the last two - My Woman (2016) and Burn Your Fire For No Witness (2014) - had been pretty great already. There's heavy orchestration on many of the songs, sparseness at other times. There are icy, churning moments which veer almost goth - the standout title track reminds me of Pornography - while elsewhere the mood traverses 'fraught Disney', contemporary torch, and all kinds of distinct singer-songwriter, with something both tender and fierce underneath every song.