ALBUM REVIEW: Helen Money – Atomic

Thrill Jockey

Released: 20.03.20

Renowned in heavier circles despite her classical origins, Alison Chesley’s unorthodox career trajectory says much of both the breadth and tone of her music. A comprehensive and absorbing body of work, this latest full-length as Helen Money underlines the Chicago-cum-L.A. artist’s brooding cello mastery, simultaneously stripping her palette and clearing space for further exploration.

Whether bowed or plucked, her instrument weaves a shrouded, sombre path, ratcheting up the tension with subtle electronics and crackling surges of distortion. More explosive passages, meanwhile, bristle with an electrifying physicality, to the point that you can almost feel her strings twanging to the beat of each striking, doom-laden riff. Minimal, overcast and endlessly expressive, it’s the sound of an audacious creative offering her most assertive statement to date.