Review: Chelsea Wolfe - She Reaches Out To She Reaches Out To She

Review: Chelsea Wolfe – She Reaches Out To She Reaches Out To She

Chelsea Wolfe's seventh full-length outing is equally bleak, sonically stirring, and thoroughly engaging.

Throughout her 14-year-long spell, there has been a cathartic quality to Chelsea Wolfe. The Californian singer-songwriter has continuously proved she’s capable of captivating, dramatic moments that pull from goth rock, doom, folk, noise, and metal. Her seventh full-length, ‘She Reaches Out to She Reaches Out to She’, sees her in an equally retrospective and optimistic mindset. Its title lends itself to a reminder to look within.

From the outset, a dark ominous cloud hangs over ‘Whispers in the Echo Chamber’s brooding tone. Industrial beats stutter alongside Wolfe‘s airy vocals before Bryan Tulao’s doom-laden, metallic guitar provides a subtle wall of distortion. Weighty percussion brings urgency to ‘House Of Self-Undoing’, countering Wolfe’s ethereal melodies, emphasising the electronic element that appears throughout these 10 songs.

Early album highlight, ‘Everything Turns Blue’, sweeps you in melodrama, elevating Wolfe‘s cathartic release as harmonious synths rise. While multi-instrumentalist Ben Chisholm’s gritty synthetic bass bubbles underneath in the verse.

At times, Wolfe, along with Chisholm, Tulao, drummer Jess Gowrie, and producer Dave Sitek (TV on the Radio), produce a juxtaposing brand of minimalist noise. For example, the fragile ‘Tunnel Lights’ is spacious with flashes of abrasiveness. Wolfe‘s voice provides the smooth with her collaborators’ occasional rough density. It’s an effective and captivating approach. Likewise, ‘Salt’ is executed with an experimental touch, covered in a bleak but enchanting tone that is hard to ignore.

Elsewhere, ‘Eyes Like Nightshade’ ticks along with mechanical production as Wolfe‘s delicate vocals float along the surface. Icy electronica wraps its hold around Wolfe‘s delicate voice on ‘The Liminal’, as she sings “I’m the storm and I’m the center, I’m your poison, I’m your tincture, They wanted me to go down easy”. electronic beats threaten to disrupt Wolfe‘s sweeping harmonies on ‘Place In The Sun’, yet thankfully refrain from doing so.

The album culminates with ‘Dusk’, with Bryan Tulao’s partly absent guitar returning with a riveting solo, complementing Wolfe‘s final words of “And I will go through the fire”. It’s a fitting finale, marking the end of Wolfe‘s journey of re-discovery, being equally reflective and hopeful, burning down the pain of past toxic situations in the process.

While there are moments of occasional respite, Wolfe‘s and Sitek have crafted a record that is equally bleak and sonically stirring. The end result is a thoroughly engaging record that meets the quality we’ve come to expect from Wolfe.

4.5/5

‘She Reaches Out To She Reaches Out To She’ by Chelsea Wolfe is released on Friday, February 9th 2024 on Loma Vista.