Chelsea Wolfe’s latest album, She Reaches Out To She Reaches Out To She, is a rebirth in process. It’s about how such a moment connects to our past, our present, and our future. It’s a powerfully cathartic statement about cutting ties, as well as an important reminder that healing is cyclical and circular, and not a simple linear process. As Wolfe explains, “It’s a record about the past self reaching out to the present self reaching out to the future self to summon change, growth, and guidance. It’s a story of setting yourself free from situations and patterns that are holding you back, in order to become self-empowered. It’s an invitation to step into your authenticity.”
On She Reaches Out To She Reaches Out To She, there are references to shedding exoskeletons, to excommunication, and to permanent fissures. The liminal, the in-between, and the unseen are recurring characters. As Wolfe puts it, “like the dark moon, that void space can feel unpredictable and looming, but it also holds so much potential, mystery, and excitement.” Dense and minimal, raw and opulent, intimate and expansive, the production also breaks apart then rebuilds—samples of the band are cut and pasted back together, heavy guitars dissolve into trip-hop breaks; the vocal delivery is both hushed and soaring. As Wolfe sings in the blistering opener, “Whispers In The Echo Chamber,” she’s “twisting the old self into poetry.” (The same track finds her “bathing in the blood of who [she] used to be.”)
There’s an intimate, ASMR-like quality to the vocals on this album, delicate and detailed. Nothing feels straightforward, left to chance, or as expected. Wolfe said of She Reaches Out: “This album demanded to be lived.” Throughout, these vocals hold specific keys to meaning, and feel sculptural.
The initial songwriting was kept to a core of longtime collaborators, as Wolfe worked closely with multi-instrumentalist Ben Chisholm, along with drummer Jess Gowrie and guitarist Bryan Tulao. The songs were written and workshopped remotely from the spring of 2020 through the end of 2021 by Wolfe and these collaborators. In early 2022, she brought the work she had collected to producer and TV On The Radio co-founder Dave Sitek, who worked with the band to deconstruct the compositions, pushing the songs into uncharted waters where they were then transformed and reborn. The pieces found their final focus at the mixing console of Shawn Everett (Slowdive, SZA, Alvvays, the Killers, Yeah Yeah Yeahs); Everett and Wolfe worked to extract the fine details from the vocals, blending them into the lush sonic production world. Everett mixed in a sense of urgency and excitement, while still maintaining the delicate sections of its production.
This leap into the unknown shouldn’t be surprising: Wolfe has never been afraid to experiment, traverse genre, or invent her own hybrids. If you return to her 2010 debut, The Grime and the Glow, amongst the room-tone atmospherics, punk drums, dark melody, and Wolfe’s commanding voice you can already see the prototypical skeleton, a visionary scratchpad, for what would follow. An early approach to She Reaches Out To She Reaches Out To She’s pulsing electronics and break beats are there in 2013’s Pain Is Beauty. 2015’s Abyss established a space between folk and industrial and noise rock and metal. 2017’s Hiss Spun burrowed deeper into heaviness. Wolfe returned to her earlier, folkier beginnings on 2019’s Birth of Violence, which was recorded at home in Northern California, and links back to 2012’s acoustic collection of songs, Unknown Rooms.
Opener “Whispers in the Echo Chamber,” ties together a number of elements Wolfe has explored in the past, rolling in dynamic waves between minimal synth electronic and heavy, full-band moments, and refracted through a hall of mirrors. The explosive “House of Self-Undoing,” a song about Wolfe getting sober after the touring for her last album concluded, feels like electronica meets post-hardcore. Wolfe explains, “When you become sober after years of numbing out, you feel, deeply: the moments of joy are euphoric, and the moments of pain are more visceral. But it’s like a call to adventure, facing life fully present is exciting when you’ve spent half your life only half-present.” Wolfe describes the song as an underworld journey – this journey takes many forms.
The slow-burn “Everything Turns Blue” is an anthem about “finding yourself again after a long era of being part of something toxic,” she says. ”Making a split with someone after 10 years, 20 years, 30 years—there’s going to be some high highs and low lows as you begin to process it all.” The production here is deep, smoky, cavernous, and glitchy. Wolfe’s voice is raw, honest, and carries a weight with it, the feeling of burnout and also healing. “I’ve been living without you here/ and it’s alright/ I’d been looking for a way out a long time/ I’ve been living without you here and I can fight/ I’ve been living softly my whole life,” she sings. On this track, Wolfe asks another question central to She Reaches Out To She Reaches Out To She: “What do I have to do to heal you out of me?”
Closer “Dusk,” which opens smoky and sensual and ends as a towering psychedelic guitar shredder, sees an empire burning and dissipating, and a dusk before a new dawn. It’s a sentiment echoed throughout She Reaches Out To She Reaches Out To She. On “Tunnel Lights,” a song that has a late-nite Twin Peaks feel until it cracks open into a miasmic swirl of analog and electric waves, is about, as Wolfe describes, “actually living instead of just ‘getting by,’ about waking up to the fact that you’ve been languishing in the dark and it’s time to start taking steps towards the lights that’ll guide you out of the tunnel-cave.”
At its core, She Reaches Out To She Reaches Out To She is realizing the way forward is through, contemplating what must be cut and left behind, while also figuring out what lies ahead and what there is to discover once you get there. Wolfe guides us on that quest, asking us these questions as she asks herself the same. As the title of the album hints, She Reaches Out to She Reaches Out to She is a reminder to look within, to remember that all the power you need resides there. Reach out to the selves, reach out to one other. Reach to the ancient and to the end of all things, to remember that the only time we truly have is now.https://chelseawolfe.com
As a first time buyer you may be nervous about purchasing tickets through a company you've not used before. This is completely understandable, which is why we want to put your mind at ease and assure you that Gigantic Tickets are a safe, reliable place to buy tickets from a primary ticket agent. We are full members of STAR - the society of Ticket Agents and Retails. STAR is the leading self-regulatory body for the entertainment ticketing industry across the United Kingdom.
STAR members include all major UK ticket agencies as well as Gigantic Tickets and numerous venues and box offices in London and across the country. There are also associate members in other industries (such as travel) where entertainment ticketing forms part of their business and affiliate members who do not sell tickets directly to the public but support STAR's work.
Buying entertainment tickets from a STAR member - in person, by phone or online - enables you to buy with confidence, as all members sign up to STAR's Code of Practice, which requires them to treat customers fairly and make all transactions clear and straightforward.
Customers buying from a STAR member will benefit from:
To give you complete peace of mind you can find Gigantic Tickets on STAR's current full membership list here and verify our full membership by clicking here.
For more information about STAR please visit their official website here.
You can find more information about ticket purchasing, ticket security, ticket delivery and much more on our FAQ's page here, as well as on our Terms & Conditions page here.
You may also want to take a peek at our Privacy Policy too so you know you really are in the safest of hands.
We appreciate reading through our web pages might take you a little while to find the answer you are looking for, so please feel free to get in touch with us directly and our team will do their utmost to answer any queries you might have:
Contact us: Click here to find your order and contact us Address : Gigantic, 3-5 High Pavement, Nottingham, NG1 1HF