Warthur
Shifting her distinctive style of ethereal wave into a more overtly electronic direction with the aid of producer Ben Chisholm, Chelsea Wolfe delivers a series of electrifying meditations on the usual gothic topics.
Opening track Feral Love sets the scene particularly well, with an ominous synth note and a darkly pulsating drum beat giving way to a tempestuous, almost orchestral musical backing, as Wolfe's vocals evoke something at the crossroads of the darkest Cocteau Twins and sparsest Dead Can Dance tracks. With folk influences creeping in here and there and a sense of atmospheric foreboding which would sit well next to the gloomiest of doom metal (even though this is not really a metal-based release), Pain Is Beauty offers astonishingly dark pop music for the bleakest dark nights of the soul.