Constantly in Love, the second record from Kælan Mikla keyboardist and back-up singer Sólveig Matthildur, is an emotional, poetic, and breathtaking creation. From the light-hearted but dead serious first single and video (“Dystopian Boy”), to the medieval symmetry of the album’s construction (spoiler: it’s a massive envelope poem), Sólveig has, quite possibly, written album for the ages.
Channeling influences as varied as trip-hop pioneers Portishead, to black metal band Urfaust, to French post-punk chanteuse Hante, Sólveig’s sophomore album is one part darkwave, one part spoken art-poetry jams, and one part electronic downtempo compositions. Rolling Stone’s David Fricke likely put it best: after seeing Sólveig live, he called her “a tablet-age reincarnation of the post–Velvet Underground Nico.”