Album Review: Sarah Mary Chadwick -- 9 Classic Tracks

The former Batrider frontwoman continues her explorations of sparse, flayed emotional fare in her second album.

Kicking off with the awkward, funereal Ask Walt, it’s clear that Chadwick is an expert in creating vignettes of social insularity, emotional fragility and spiritual mourning. The absence of guitar in the main, replaced with lush soundscapes, evokes a bold move into untethered territory, yet Chadwick seems all the stronger and surefooted for it. As much as Am I Worth It and Lying Down haunt, this is an album of an artist soaring.