Chelsea Wolfe Unknown Rooms: A Collection of Acoustic Songs

Here we get to indulge in an atmosphere-drenched album of dusky American chamber-folk from a woman who is apparently a heavier sounding proposition on her previous recordings. I've not heard them therefore this disc will have to stand on its own merits. She has a lovely regret-tinged voice that coats these faintly tragic sounding ballads and slow movements of sparse heartbreak rock.

I'm taken with the subtle strings which add a portentous drama to lulling opener 'Flatlands'. The wistful soulful backing coos on ‘The Way We Used To' are beautiful to say the least. The closest comparison I can muster is if Warpaint adopted the style of Nina Nastasia. That is all I can think about the vibe I'm getting here, which is a good thing as both artists have something cerebral, harmonious and spiritual in common which makes the stylistic union a very natural one for me.

'I Died With You' is also of note, thirty seconds of her circling voice that sounds multi-tracked, trailing round your mind in a trilling, spectral, wispy fashion, like the apparition of a genie from a bottle that turns out, in fact, to be both the CocoRosie girls. I think they'd look great dressed as genies! 'Boyfriend' also haunts, being a clunky exorcism retaining a sombre Earth-like guitar motif, piano clunks and culminating with the solemn parp of a hollow reedy organ coda. Good stuff indeed from this massive goth from Sacramento.