NL Premiere

Maria Somerville is a musician whose songs – sparse and lush in equal measure – reflect the landscape of the west of Ireland, the place she calls home. Awash in glimmering, reverberating guitars and accompanied by her unmistakable, soft vocals, Somerville creates slowcore for accelerated times. Known for her cult-favourite early morning broadcasts on NTS Radio, Somerville’s immense talents as a selector are echoed in the vast influences that seep into her forthcoming album on label 4AD – follow-up to 2019 debut All My People. Arriving at resonances that are both out of time and timeless, one might hear in Somerville the raspy lustre of Bilinda Butcher’s voice, the chasmic ambience of Grouper’s production, or the jangle splendour of Galaxie 500’s guitars. Yet despite this, there is a current coursing through Somerville’s songs that make each entirely her own. This music is made to be basked in; like sunlight filtering through leaves, it is ungraspable, eliciting a nu-stalgia that is impossible to give words to.