Sarah Kinsley - Escaper

If there’s one thing you can immediately grasp from listening to ‘Escaper’, it’s that New York’s Sarah Kinsley has left no stone unturned in crafting her debut, both in terms of her emotional commitment to the project, and her willingness to musically throw it all at the wall (among the instruments she turns her hand to on the record are piano, guitar, synth, violin, and, er, glass bowls). Where ‘Beautiful Things’ and ‘Barrel Of Love’ are cast in the balladic, melancholic mould of Lana Del Rey or Weyes Blood, the sweeping strings and exponential pace of opener ‘Last Time We Never Meet Again’ is thrillingly evocative – who can hear the lyric “I hope I hear your name and feel absolutely nothing” and not be immediately put in mind of one particular person? 

‘There Was A Room’, meanwhile, offers more electronic flavours, its skittering beat fidgeting with impatience before bursting into a technicolour chorus. It’s the audio equivalent of the very moment of falling in love; it’s Elbow’s ‘Starlings’ through an alt-pop prism. Aptly, Sarah too has a song named after the birds, though hers is an ode to the fulfilling depths of platonic friendship, rather than romantic connection. More multifaceted than your average singer-songwriter and yet not really a pop girly either, Sarah Kinsley occupies a curious space between the two, merging dramatic, ambitious, and undeniably catchy arrangements with a vocal dexterity and lyrical sensitivity that are truly transporting. If latest single ‘Realms’ imagines the huge scope of alternate realities out there, to listen to ‘Escaper’ is to believe their existence possible.