Ríona Sally Hartman: Big Starving Thing | Album Review

Dubliner Ríona Sally Hartman is capable of using her voice like an instrument, but she is a writer too, interested in the observations and speculations of the poet.

Her finely-crafted debut album unites the musician and the songwriter, drawing water from many wells, from folk and jazz to alt pop and contemporary lieder.

Her songs unfold like a series of magic realist short stories, pungently told and peopled by loners and weirdos: a lovelorn peeping Tom; an insomniac fortune teller; a Frida Kahlo-obsessed fish.

Yet even as the subject matter challenges and perplexes, the craft of the songs draws you in – delicate vocal harmonies and sparse acoustic settings, fresh and uncliched, perhaps bearing most comparison with intrepid New York singers like Theo Bleckmann and Becca Stevens.

[ rionasallyhartman.com ]