Waxahatchee 

Cerulean Salt

Don Giovanni

Street: 03.05

Waxahatchee = Liz Phair + Cat Power + Carissa’s Weird 

On her first album, American Weekend, Katie Crutchfield (P.S. Eliot, Bad Banana) sang personally devastating songs about the great universals—love and loss. There she showed off an enormous songwriting talent that was nurtured on cross-country tours. With Cerulean Salt, Crutchfield has added denser instrumentation—electric guitar, bass and drums—that complement her songwriting perfectly. A song like “Coast to Coast” is a rockin’ example, with a Breeders’ sugary-style hook, while most of the songs benefit from lighter, melancholic arrangements. The result, still grounded in sorrow, is a more mature outlook—about moving forward after the harrowing loss spoken about on American Weekend. –Christian Schultz