SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: FLORA HIBBERD – SWIRL

FLORA HIBBERD
SWIRL
22TWENTY RECORDS

New singer-songwriters seem to crop up in a single day, and the competition (if it really exists) for the attention of an audience is even stiffer. Some of these artists can show what they are made of on a first listen, while others create music that is more detailed and evolves more slowly but usually leaves a more lasting effect.

The latter is the impression created by Swirl, the debut album by British singer-songwriter Flora Hibberd, who is based in Paris, but recorded in Eau Claire, WI. Those initiated will remember that this is the hometown of Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon. Yet, musically, the connection between Hibberd and Vernon is more in the line of thinking that a direct musical influence.

And while Hibberd, like Vernon, puts a hefty emphasis on the lyrics, she dresses her songs with more bedroom pop overtones, that give space for her lyrics to shine here.

Even though it is a debut, Swirl plays like an already accomplished achievement that promises even better things from Hibberd.

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