Album Review: Ngaiire - Lamentations

Infused with emotion and bursting with talent, Ngaiire's future soul debut Lamentations is a stunning work. Clocking in at just over half-an-hour with only nine tracks, the album is punchy and concise. Strongly collaborative, it was created with bassist and producer Tim Curnick and Japan-based pianist Aaron Choulai and features vocal guests on two tracks. Sydney folksters Brian Campeau and Elana Stone help close the album on Ordinary, and Nai Palm from Melbourne's future soul group Hiatus Kaiyote blazes on stand-out track Dirty Hercules. However, it's Ngaiire's vocal in its many configurations that takes the listener's breath away. While the precise electronic textures provide grit, texture and colour to the proceedings, it's the plaintive humanness of her voice that is the centrepiece. Harmonies upon harmonies are the consistent joy of the record, creating a lush and dynamic foundation for the tightly-written and intricately-produced songs.

There is pointed imagery of wars, grief, confusion and loss within the sensual and serpentine melodies. Some tracks fight back, like Uranus and feisty Dirty Hercules (“If you wanna pick a fight, why don't ya, why don't ya?”). Others hypnotise and then strike, like the beautifully menacing Count To Ten's reference to a “massacre in the sanctuary”, and current single Around coolly asking “When the government calls you to war/Are you gonna fight with me by my side/Are you gonna lay your gun on the table/Will you walk away/Give me up to the enemy?”. Then it is on the ballads Fireflies and ABCD that Ngaiire lays bare emotion and truly laments, and the effect is spine-tingling.

Beautiful and well-rounded, Ngaiire's Lamentations is a mature and evocative debut.