Skullcrusher – And Your Song Is Like a Circle

Helen Ballentine's stage name Skullcrusher braces listeners for fierce, fiery metal, but the reality behind the moniker is haunting folk vignettes defined by ethereal, floaty vocals. Her second album, And Your Song Is Like a Circle, grapples with dissociation, blurred identity and grief.

The desperate search for meaning running through the veins of this record makes itself heard immediately; on opener March, Ballentine asks bluntly, ‘What do I live for?’ The question seeps through the album, forcing us to search for answers ourselves. A sparse opener, it relies on wordless cries that ripple around piercing lyrics.

Ballentine's voice is the most versatile instrument across the record; it hovers and soars, disembodied. Dragon blurs these muffled, underwater harmonies with clashing drums; Maelstrom documents spiralling and dissociation through cries stifled by industrial drums and conversations.

We wander from truth to façade, somewhere between escapism and realism. Red Car glints with gentle guitars, despite the glaring hues and vivid images. A repressed memory resurfaces with crackling distortion, met with her admission that 'silence lingers long after I've gone'. Circle weighs heavy with its search for meaning, but makes no attempt to gloss over the answers.

Listen to: Red Car, Dragon, Vessel