Natalie Mering’s (Weyes Blood) newest LP, “And In The Darkness, Hearts Aglow”, picks up right where “Titanic Rising” left us in 2019. Even the album covers bear similar imagery. On the latter’s, Mering is underwater in a bedroom, suspended in an oceanic ether above a wine-red carpet. Light pours in through the bellowing, jellyfish-translucent curtains. It’s as if she’s stranded and the shipwreck has not yet sunken down to the seabed. On the cover of “Hearts Aglow”, Mering appears to still be below the surface, her hair drifting through the water like a slow-motion wave, her chest, quite literally, bursting with a sun-red gleam. There’s a stillness afoot, a rubble above ready to be pieced back together. And Mering is standing atop the debris
Weyes Blood’s (aka Natalie Mering) voice has always been an illumination, wavering delicately among her surrounding folk-pop instrumentals. Her newest track, “Grapevine,” upholds this legacy of hers. With an orchestral backing, complete with bells and swooping synth, this track builds up to a magnificent crescendo, with Mering’s voice guiding the way. The lyrics describe a love epic, taking place on the road, with lines like “California’s my body / And your fire runs over me” giving you a sense of place, while leaving you with goosebumps. Mering herself searches throughout this entire track, singing, “When I see the light / Shining across the freeway late at night / Start to drift over the line / And it hits me for the first time / Now we’re just two cars passing by / On the Grapevine.”
Her yearning sears into you, carving through the layers of the song decisively, making everything point toward her loved one. Mering explains the tragic note embedded in the song, saying, “Technology is harvesting our attention away from each other. We all have a ‘Grapevine’ entwined around our past with unresolved wounds and pain. Being in love doesn’t necessarily mean being together.”
Weyes Blood the album ‘And In The Darkness, Hearts Aglow’, out November 18th, 2022 on Sub Pop Records
The Fat Angel Sings 