Weyes Blood – And in the Darkness, Hearts Aglow

Constant, baroque building from Weyes Blood has inevitably led to their grand statement. One big moment to cement themselves as frontrunners for the genre. And in the Darkness, Hearts Aglow is as touching and intimate as such a title would imply. Starting strong with the lush and comfortable It’s Not Just Me, It’s Everybody, is a harpsichord and piano ballad that meshes well with the consistencies currently shown by Blood. Under that Weyes Blood banner comes a soundscape of real delicacy, it could come apart at any moment. Credit to Natalie Merring, who under the Weyes Blood name has crafted a quality record of demanding yet calming tracks.

That authority lingers with the collection of simple audible strokes that give life to the likes of It’s Not Just Me, It’s Everybody and Children of the Empire. Those charms are founded well in the length of the tracks, the two longest tracks of the piece are the best of all. They are the crowning moments on a very solid record not just due to the length but because of how Weyes Blood adapts the momentum of each track. Instrumentally they strike through as calming, sombre pieces that fit those isolated, calming moods. Children of the Empire is a particularly striking track though, with an incredible reliance on impressive vocals and casting aside the fear of fear. Abundant those qualities are on Grapevine and beyond, they are best inferred and understood on the opening tracks.

Key to God Turn Me Into a Flower is the vocal presence Blood offers. Utterly stunning. As the attention begins to drift toward those lower and constant hums of notes cementing themselves, Blood’s prominence rips through and causes a key surge of new energy. There were worries of a lag in consistency, but And in the Darkness, Hearts Aglow, gets stronger and stronger as it pushes through with its sentimental, beautiful feeling. Hearts Aglow is a tremendous, powerful A-Side ender, a title track worthy of its lofty place on the front of the album. For all the grace and spontaneity of the earlier tracks, Twin Flame does relatively little. It is a solid beginning to the B-Side, but little comes of its mixing.

Holding the momentum of the first half would be a credible and near-impossible achievement. A Given Thing rounds up a spotty latter few tracks with an excellent recovery phase. It is not as though In Holy Flux or The Worst Is Done are bad tracks, they are just forgettable. They do not hold the momentum earlier tracks do, and for Weyes Blood there is a sense that the sacrifice is worth it. And in the Darkness, Hearts Aglow is as touching as it is moving. Baroque pop continues to strike through with quality release after quality release, Blood’s work here is absolutely no exception to that consistently striking rule of thumb. Rounding out an album is just as important as introducing it, and while there are spotty points toward the end, Blood holds firm in introducing and exiting her latest works with a surreal quality to them.