Nighttime – “Keeper Is The Heart” – [Ba Da Bing!]

Thurston Hunger   3/5/2023   A Library, CD

“Keeper of the Heart” offers swirling ballads. Despite some of the blustery scenarios and lyrics, there is warmth in this Nighttime. That flows from Eva Louise Goodman, her voice frequently multitracked. She is Nighttime, in song and various instrumentation, but a constellation of other musicians clusters around her. Notably Adam Lytle adds a very deft mellotron touch. Acoustic guitar anchors the songs, but light psych flute dapples certain tracks. Strings on “Spring” add that ol’ timey ache. Certain chord progressions are familiar, with a gentle righteous (non-denominational) resolve to them. In particular I’m thinking of “The Fool” and “The Sea.” On first listen, it was hard to shake the Nico from my headphones. That said she’s an Amercan gal (Hudson Valley, NY) raised on UK 60’s folk promises. For more recent references, I could hear this album woven in a set with Josephine Foster and Weyes Blood even some Paula Frazer (“Ring of Fire” offers a ghost western smoke lament). Almost an invocation to summon Espers’ “Dead Queen” but Goodman’s voice is more tied to the seasons and soil, less ethereal; Nighttime’s sound more burnished, less lysergic. Still a charm of a sonic locket.

-Thurston Hunger