Circuit des Yeux Reaching for Indigo

Over four studio albums and numerous EPs, American vocalist, composer, producer and artist Haley Fohr has been exploring a meditative musical landscape, looking deep within and encouraging listeners to do the same. ‘Reaching For Indigo’ follows a similar path, but is an altogether darker, more dramatic beast. Mysterious too; the songs here supposedly reference “a moment that fell down in the life of Fohr on January 22, 2016”, although there are few clues as to exactly what occurred here.

Whatever is was can’t have been good. A sickly unease hangs over all eight tracks, an unresolved tension rising and falling like a stormy sea. Droning synths and nervous strings smudge into each other while her voice, a world-weary, soulful sound that’s part Nico, part ANOHNI, has never been as haunted and affecting, the black hole that everything else swirls around. The melodrama may be uncomfortable, but Fohr wears the gloom well; her uniqueness remains compelling, even while swimming through the darkness, searching for the light.