BRUN, ANE - How Beauty Holds The Hand Of Sorrow (Sealed) (CD)

2020 sees Norwegian songstress Ane Brun return with her first albums of new material since 2015. Now only a month after the release of After The Great Storm Brun follows that with a second album titled How Beauty Holds The Hand Of Sorrow. With eighteen songs united by common themes, Brun’s original intention was for a double album, but, as lockdown kicked in, spare time imposed by the pandemic led her to reassess this concept. So, while she and her team administered final touches remotely, she added one last song, before separating the recordings into two collections, distinguished by contrasting moods. Both, of course, are quintessentially Brun, but after the more upbeat After the Great Storm – which finds her in questing mode, drawing upon her experiences both in performance and in collaboration, her crystal-clear, affecting voice haunted by electronic and analogue textures – How Beauty Holds the Hand of Sorrow finds Brun returning to her early works intimate poignancy and will be more familiar to those who recall Brun as the emotional, guitar-picking singer-songwriter who emerged at the turn of the century.