Metal-influenced folkie Chelsea Wolfe navigates the darkest chasms
One of the more remarkable practitioners in the crop of folk upstarts to emerge from Northern California’s so-called freak-folk scene around the beginning of the decade, Chelsea Wolfe stood out for several reasons. For one, her starkly pitch-black aesthetic did well to set her far apart from her woodsy contemporaries, but so did her uncannily timeless songwriting voice, a truly remarkable instrument that channels old-soul country spirit via the annals of extreme music through the decades. Wolfe counts Burzum, Sibylle Baier and Nick Cave as major influences, having notably covered songs by each in the past.
Wolfe’s new album, Abyss, is her most dynamic record to date, with highlights ranging from the molten metal of lead single “Iron Moon” to the hushed balladry of “After The Fall.” The LP finds Wolfe further exploring the largely synth-heavy sound she began to dabble with on 2013’s Pain Is Beauty, between blasts of distorted guitar, courtesy of Russian Circles’ Mike Sullivan, who guests throughout the record alongside regular collaborators Ben Chisholm, Dylan Fujioka and Ezra Buchla. Though it’s only the second of her records that’s not been self-produced, and Wolfe claims it was hard to let go of some of the songs in their initial, demo-version forms, she’s quick to praise producer John Congleton (whose recent credits include acts as varied Swans, Angel Olsen and Xiu Xiu) for teasing out the full dynamic range of these 11 songs.
Abyss is also the most directly personal record Wolfe has ever written, examining her own experiences with sleep paralysis, along with what she refers to as “society’s failures, disorders and scars.” These themes are perhaps captured best in the self-directed video of album opener “Carrion Flowers,” shot around her new home in Southern California, casting the arid, drought-ridden landscape as a stark counterpoint to the album’s themes.
—Möhammad Choudhery
