Evocative, Laurel Canyon-influenced album, which includes some nuanced and beautiful acoustic folk songs.
meka is the musical alter ego of the Californian-born artist Melissa Lingo. Although her roots are in the US, she has travelled the globe, living in Brazil, Cambodia, and India, as well as residing in Budapest and Prague. This album was recorded in Stockholm, Sweden, at Rymden Studios, and produced and engineered by Daniel Bengtson, who has also worked with First Aid Kit, M Ward and James Yorkston, amongst others. It’s a beautifully crafted record which could have come out sometime in the early 1970s. It has undoubtedly been inspired by songwriters from that era, such as Joni Mitchell, Vashti Bunyan, Linda Perhacs and Nick Drake; more contemporary artists that spring to mind when listening to these songs include Alela Diane and Laura Marling.
The arrangements of songs such as ‘Temperance’ certainly encapsulate the spirit and sound of Laurel Canyon while capturing a sense of loss as meka journeys to visit a newly widowed friend through a Californian landscape recently devastated by wildfires. The beautiful string arrangement adds to its sense of melancholy. Another highlight is the piano-led ‘Tomato Song,’ which merges visions, dreams and memories of meka sitting with her mother in her garden. She says that the song “is ripe with rot, an ode to the in-between, to the Graveyard of Dreams, which also happens to be the Fertile Compost for Hope”. The album closes with ‘What Once Was’, fingerpicked on an acoustic guitar, in which meka ruminates on her ramblings. It’s underlain by some fiddle playing that complements her graceful and evocative voice perfectly.
Although the imagery used in many of the songs is often minimal, it still manages to paint formidable and striking pictures. The emotional layers of the writing, in many cases, metamorphose personal pain into moments of beauty and connection. meka says that she is “perpetually struck by hope and grief”; this album certainly encompasses both of these whilst finding magic in the mundane. It’s a record that provides a timely reminder that there can be power in being understated and nuanced.
