Austra – Olympia (Domino)

Austra absolutely kills it on this album. As a long time fan, perhaps I am biased in favor of Katie Stelmanis’s ethereal vocals and the almost unintelligible lyrics, but this album has a transcendent quality that is nearly intoxicating. “Painful Like” and “Sleep” are gorgeous wails of abstraction, while “Home” soars with searing catharsis. The entire album is an overwhelming crescendo of emotion–perfectly tempered by Stelmanis’s incredible vocal range. Literally any track would be perfectly paired with most tracks from The xx’s Coexist or The Knife’s Deep Cuts. –H. McKee, 28. Aug, 2013