Once you’ve been saddled with the moniker of “David Lynch’s muse”, there’s really no escaping it. The eccentric director of Twin Peaks, Blue Velvet, Mulholland Drive et al saw something in actor and musician Chrystabell back in the late 1990s that struck a chord with him. Perhaps the fact that her father owned a cemetery appealed to the offbeat filmmaker? For her part, the Texas-born singer born Chrysta Bell Zucht has embraced her role as Lynch’s creative stimulant; this is their third album together, following This Train in 2011 and 2016′s Somewhere in the Nowhere.
In-between those albums, both Zucht and Lynch have both dabbled in solo releases, and the former even made an appearance as Special Agent Tammy Preston in the 2017 revival of Twin Peaks. It’s clear, however, that their most successful collaboration is musical, although Cellophane Memories very nearly collapses under the weight of its own mythology.
Their previous fare proved quirky yet listenable, and Chystabell’s more recent solo outings have been dynamic and diverse, from 2017′s John Parish-produced We Dissolve to the offbeat synthpop peddled on 2022′s Midnight Sunbeams. Here, there is much talk of travelling through portals and being inspired by visions of “a night-time walk through a forest of tall trees”, painting a visual landscape that is arguably crafted at the expense of the songs. With minimalist instrumentation and production, She Knew sets the tone from the beginning, its Angelo Badalamenti-esque synthesised throb creating a hymnal atmosphere as Chrystabell’s overlapping vocals compound the weirdness and make Lynch’s lyrics difficult to decipher. (Incidentally, the late Badalamenti is credited on two songs, including closing track Sublime Eternal Love.) The Twin Peaks-fest continues on the shimmering You Know the Rest, utilising the eerie reverse-speak vocals made famous on that show, while Enya is given a run for her money on the ethereal breathiness of Two Lovers Kiss.
These compositions are designed to place Chrystabell’s voice at the forefront of each song. When it works, as heard on the disconcerting Dance of Light, her murmur sounds like a shiver-inducing voice in your ear. When it doesn’t, it makes for a patience-fraying experience. The overlapping vocal technique is overused, each off-kilter torch song bearing the same aural hallmarks as the next with only vague snatches of lyrics audible – from “For dinner it was meat and potatoes / I went to bed early” to “The air was alive, pieces were everywhere / Flying, flying, gathering together”. These morose ballads are painstakingly eked out with only one or two songs – including the atmospheric dark incantation of The Answers to the Questions – providing respite from the languorous pace. These variations on the same theme are perfectly nice as a background soundtrack, but ultimately too vague to form a clear, compelling picture.
