Angel Olsen: Burn Your Fire for No Witness

Emily Zemler on March 18, 2014

On Angel Olsen’s latest album, the singer-songwriter finds an apt balance between lo-fi acoustic folk and bluesy electric rock. The record, a follow-up to her debut Half Way Home, feels both timeless and vintage, eschewing complex and polished production elements for intimately wrought numbers that embrace raw sincerity. On “Hi-Five,” a gritty, static-laced track, Olsen achingly wails, “I’m giving you my heart/ Are you giving me your heart?” with visceral emotion—a sensibility that resonates throughout the album. You might as well be in the room with the musician as she steadily croons on the propulsive single “Forgiven/Forgotten” or softly tiptoes around on sparse, sad closer “Windows,” a song that lends a true sense of melancholy to the disc.

Artist: Angel Olsen
Album: Burn Your Fire for No Witness
Label: Jagjaguwar