The follow-up to 2015’s acclaimed Love Letters and Other Missiles, which garnered nominations for a MOBO and an Urban Music Award, this third album from vocalist, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Julia Biel presents another hauntingly enigmatic collection of mostly self-penned songs of an exceptional drama, breadth and craft. Co-written by Biel and album co-producer Idris Rahman, the single ‘Wasting Breath’, a song about leaving your emotional baggage behind, features one of several gorgeous string arrangements. Songs such as ‘Something Beautiful’ and ‘Critical Condition’ are incredibly rich in ear-catching detail and nuance, with Biel and Rahman creating utterly distinctive soundworlds that you really want to linger in and explore. Biel’s voice is unfailingly beautiful in tone throughout, nowhere more so than when creating striking, multilayered backing vocals on ‘Dead Slept Rough’. The album’s sole cover, a compelling reinvention of ‘Feeling Good’, is brought so closely within the album’s aesthetic orbit that it could almost have been written for the date.