Halou makes sexy and chic haute couture music. The metallic sheen of the electronics contrasts nicely with the serrated fuzz guitar and the satiny orchestrations of synth and cello. The songs aren’t always immediately hummable, but they are arrestingly complex. The singer, Rebecca Cosebloom, has a pure, pliable soprano that is given various sonic treatments, from static to echoes that adds texture to her vocal lines. Her singing is so precise and mannered that she can seem frostily aloof. This dramatically contrasts with her lyrics, which are surprisingly down-to-earth. Character sketches (“Everything is OK”) and well-worn advice (perhaps to herself)…

This is AGS’s most experimental album yet, as they twist their patented dream-pop sound into darker and harder territory. Tracks like “Cold Sea,” and “Last Tear” flirt with metal, while pieces like “In The Darkest Night” and the title track are almost completely sweet indie-pop—think Velocity Girl. There are still ambient guitar parts—the glimmering “Edge of the World” could be a Victorialand outtake and “Fodderwing” wispily flutters by. Guitarist Scott Ferrell does a couple of old -fashioned virtuoso licks along side the jangly, shimmery textures, and Erin Welton opens her voice up. The rougher singing on “Last Tear” and “Darkest…

Paula Frazer is one part Neko Case alt-country, one part k.d. lang modern torch, and one part Elizabeth Fraser soaring vocalesse. Her songcraft borrow liberally from classic 60s/early 70s pop country, and some of the pieces and their arrangements will remind listeners of the "countrypolitian" orchestrations of Hem. Patsy Cline, the Carpenters and obscure 60s pop songs are the terrain she explores. Her voice is simply thrilling when it slides from a heartbreakingly fragile alto to a wordless flighty soprano that would make Roy Orbison green with envy.

From:
http://ethereal-lad.livejournal.com/301900.html

Marissa Nadler is a singer from an alternate universe. In this world, laurel-wreathed maidens sit on the wooden porches of their mountain cabins, weaving their colorful tapestry and humming tales of doomed love. Nadler's second album is sparse, but the two main instruments-her delicate, yet intricate guitar and her crystalline soprano fill it up. The songs she writes are part Appalachian murder ballads, part the musings of a young girl who's absorbed the works of Poe. This dark, dreamy album is an artifact from the Bronte sibling's imagined world, full of ghastly beauty and tragic romance

In cognitive therapy, the point is to defeat your bad core beliefs (“I’m too fat”; “I’m an annoying personality”; “I’m not worthy of love,” etc.) Lisa Germano sets her bad core beliefs to music, singing them in a low, husky whisper-speak. It would almost be comical (and there’s plenty of gallows humor in her lyrics) if she didn’t construct interesting sound environments to put to confessionals to. That’s right: I said “sound environments” and not songs, because that’s what they are. They are formless, folk-flavored dreampop lullabies created with violins, music box figures and soft guitar feedback. Its music from…

Karin Hoghielm sings in Gotlandish and wordlessly against complex pieces composed of violins, pianos and traditional acoustic Swedish instruments. Her keening, glottal voice will remind one of Lisa Gerrard or the Trio Bulgaria–women speaking to spirits. Her compositions mix the modern and ancient; she's part Arvo Part and part Hildegard Von Bingen.

http://www.prikosnovenie.com/groupes/karink.html

–Craig
Apocryphal

Intensely insular songs of introspection and pain, this Piano Magic album is a document of beauty. Johnson's poetry is beautiful and vivid, and his thin wavering voice reminds me of Ian Curtis and Mark Hollis (Talk Talk). He has a female counterpart, Angele David-Guillou, who sings the more vulnerable parts of John's poetry in a glacial soprano as pure as the crystals in the Fortress of Solitude. The music is cinematic and atmosphere. Joy Division, The Mortal Coil, dreampop, blisspop, and electronic mingle together in a hypnotic mélange.Piano Magic

Take a pinch of Sarah Fimm’s piano and electronica sound, mix in a little Rasputina-style cello-playing, add a dash of the Dresden Dolls’ post-cabaret, and you have Morgan. Her voice is beautiful and can soar to operatic heights, her lyrics poetic, confessional and full of gallow’s humor (Sonnet is about abortion). Her compositions are catchy and tinged with darkwave. Recommended.

Having evokes a desert landscape in its sound. Open spaces, arid guitarlines, the heatwaves of effects/pedals/delays and Anna-Lynne Williams' hazy, just-below the horizon vocals. Though often lumped in with the "dreampop" movement, their melancholic sound reminds one more of the slo-core merchants Low wedded to the desultory countrified pyschedelia of Mazzy Star. Williams' voice sounds like Aimee Mann's; but her delivery recalls the whispery way Margo Timmins of the Cowboy Junkies sings. Her singing is like a tumbleweed across the illusory, dry landscapes of the music.

World-weary lyrics and voices steeped in loss and loneliness. Echoing music full of accordians, musical saws, piano and upright bass. Sara Lov's wounded voice and Dustin Halloran's cinematic, noir-tinged songcraft would be perfect in David Lynch movie. Imagine a lounge of faded red velvet, with vinyl booth seats torn and bleeding foam, a voice of infinite sadness reaches to you from a dimily-lit stage….