news
Sound Advice: Lost August by Lisa Bozikovic
Every Tuesday, Torontoist scours record store shelves in search of the city’s most notable new releases and brings you the best—or sometimes just the biggest—of what we’ve heard in Sound Advice.
The extended Bellwoods family continues to multiply and inhabit the city as one of its most recent additions, singer/songwriter Lisa Bozikovic turns her sole shining contribution to the last Friends in Bellwoods compilation into a full-length debut. Lost August, available now via Zunior, is every bit as sparse and melancholy as “The Letting Go”‘s haunting organ lament teased.
Featuring contributions from members of community matriarchs Ohbijou, as well as local member-swapping indie-experimenters Muskox and Steamboat, Lost August is a self-exploratory work that ranges in influence. “No Denial” is where Bozikovic perhaps best uses the natural, plaintive cadence of not much else than her voice and words to strong emotional effect over minimal piano chords and layered strings; “Take and Take” (streaming above) is an almost-pop number with a stronger hint of organ-romp roots-rock soul that’s only really felt elsewhere in tone, and “Phone Cord” is a mish-mash of more recognizable indie-rock rhythms and synths courtesy of the ever-dabbling production work of Sandro Perri. Like the Weather Station’s Tamara Lindeman or college radio’s star pupil Julie Doiron, Bozikovic tends to tip-toe around obvious melodies all over Lost August; the deliberate elusiveness is what gives these soft songs edge, and her modest, sincere vocal delivery gives the songs their intrigue and weight. Instrumentally, Bozikovic explores a number of intricate orchestrations through the entire album, but the arrangements are never overpowering and her delicate structures are given a good first home.
Even when translation is sometimes lost in its scattered eclecticism, Lost August places Bozikovic not only on the city’s music map but in the wider scope of the country’s often brilliant, mostly just-off-the-radar roster of female singer-songwriters lady talent.