Lydia Ainsworth : "Darling of the Afterglow"

I get so many albums in my in-box I am sure there is a great deal of awesome music I might be missing out on as I can't listen to everything and unless something seems like it's going to be dark enough for me it gets passed over. So she is lucky she happened to be wear a leather dress in one of her promo pictures that made me more curious.  The vocals are beautifully layered against slick piano driven pop beat that focuses on being steamier than it does trying to make you dance along. This Toronto native's back is  classical music and film scoring. I can hear the cinematic quality, but it's not rigid like classical music can be. Her harmonies are pretty amazing. The second song is not as smooth, there is more movement and layers. The choice of instrumentation is interesting this is one of the best produced albums I have hear in a long time. The clarity of every thing that feels like it is surrounding you is immersive even at the album's most intimate moments.

"Ricochet" pulls back in more firmly by my heartstrings. It's one of those moments when the sounds hit me where I am at emotionally. "Afterglow" feels like a 90s ballad that Kate Bush or Sinead O'Connor might have written,so I am on board for that. "Open Doors" is more of an ethereal drift until the odd change of pace that introduces guitar in the mix that drives the song like something the Police might have done in the 80s. "Spinning" has more of the kind of movement that drew me into this album in the first place. The fret-less bass on here is a nice touch. "Into the Blue" doesn't really set it self from other Euro-pop as much as the other songs on this album.

Her piano cover of "Wicked Game" is not as dark as Chris Isaak's version. It is not as fragile as you might think it would be.  "I Can Feel It All" is smooth groove that finds modern electronic pop colliding with 90s songwriting.  "WLCM" lyrically is more powerful for me. I think when she really gives her self room to pour emotion into the song that she is at her peak. The album ends with "Nighttime Watching" feels very Kate Bush to me as well. I'll give this one a 9.5 and see how it sits with me, some of the most breath taking songs balances the songs that run into more common pop zip codes.