There is a tenderness and directness at the centre of Sarah Gagnon’s songwriting that stands alone amongst the busy and beautiful Bay Area underground. Unabashed and unafraid, she wears her heart on her sleeve, wrapping her incomparable vocals around soulful dreampop melodies steeped in magic.
New album Arrow of Love, Gagnon’s third under the Hectorine banner, is an indisputable triumph, assured in its conception and emphatic in its delivery. Assisted by key Bay Area players such as Itinerant Home Recordings’ Geoff Saba and long-time collaborator Max Stanley, the album’s sumptuous arrangements ebb and flow beautifully. From Is Love An Illusion’s weary battlecry through to the all-consuming hope that drives penultimate track Take A Chance With Me, no stone is left unturned in Gagnon’s search for truth, meaning and understanding. Essential.
Arrow of Love is available now via Take a Turn Records. You can order vinyl or digital here. UK readers can pick up the physical at Monorail.
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