While creating her fourth album with Nick Huggins, at his beach studio on Wadawurrung Country in Port Lonsdale, Jess Ribeiro spent many months as the only guest at a nearby hotel.
“Maybe if I wore sunglasses inside/ I won’t feel tired…” – you can tell Ribeiro is singing this record’s stark opener – underscored by haunting drone, sustained piano chords and improvisational drumming – super-close to the mic.
Everything Is Now follows, Ribeiro’s layered vocals now sounding eerily detached, mesmerised (“The river is calling me away upstream…”) amidst plucked melodies and woozy guitar accents.
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Far from the party anthem one might expect from its title, Summer Of Love’s title track is a lament. Here, Ribeiro navigates the complicated loss of Niamh, a close friend since childhood who went missing during their gap year – spent together – more than two decades ago (the case was reopened recently, which reawakened her anguish).
“I lost my friend/ I cut my hair and decided I’d start a brand new life when we parted…” – strings flow in and out of the arrangement like waves of grief.
Latest single Jump The Gun – with its paranoid/unkind-innervoice BVs and manic, discordant sax solo played by Jazz Party’s Darcy McNulty – features Jim White (Dirty Three, Xylouris White) and Dave Mudie (L.A. Mood, Courtney Barnett) on percussion.
Elsewhere: standout track Airborne, delivered in sprechgesang, sifts through vivid memories; strings are the wind beneath Helicopter’s wings until it crashlands into percussive cacophony; and Howl was written while Ribeiro was “losing [her] mind” in a campground – the sole camper, she soon found herself talking to The Grampians’ native wildlife.
Summer Of Love’s profound intimacy galvanises genuine active listening throughout.
LABEL: POISON CITY
RELEASE: 12 APR
