Album Review: Emma Heeney - After The Fireworks

After The Fireworks took two years to make and the Emma Heeney who came out wasn’t the same one who went in. The Melbourne-based songstress has a history in indie-pop, but this is a ten-track ode to melancholy. Heeney’s voice is artfully emotive (all dips and breaks), while the songcraft feels meticulously, even aggressively avoidant of cliché. It’s strange – everything feels in its place yet somewhat off, somehow anti-melodic, sceptical of the delicate and comfortable. Maybe it’s apt. It’s a record about regret and missing out – the sense of an ending in a few soft-strunmed chords.