Eve Adams’s third album Metal Bird is a thing of exquisite beauty that is darkly alluring yet sparse and hazy. Melancholy and intimate vocals accompanied by little more than a guitar and an occasional unobtrusive saxophone tell tales of love and loss, of insecurity and loneliness, in a way that Hope Sandoval and Lana Del Rey often hint at but never quite manage.
Mature and considered yet dreamy and ethereal, it’s an album to be heard alone, maybe with a glass of something strong to hand, in the middle of the night. Unfussy and often quite raw production adds to the confessional nature of Adams’s songs, giving them more than enough gravitas to be mysterious and unobtrusive yet far from insubstantial background noise. It may not be an album that is likely to glue itself to the stereo for extended periods of time but it’s sure to be one that is revisited over and over again, when the time is right.
“Blues Look the Same” is a luscious tale of lost innocence, shaded with moody slide guitar, while “Woman on your Mind” tells of an unhappy mistress with a beautiful subtlety. “Prisoner” brings a spaced-out drone that is mellow and woozy and “A Walk in the Park” adds a jazzy but shuffling groove. Metal Bird may have a definite sound but it’s not one that sticks to a formula.
Adams’s songs feel that they could accompany the stories of any number doomed cinematic heroines, but they have more than enough character to reach far beyond an obvious bleak and unsettling end. For while there is many a mournful tale of woe on Metal Bird, it’s far from relentless misery. Rather, it's a rich collection to encourage recovery and recuperation before facing the world once again when the storm has passed.
