EMA- PAST LIFE MARTYRED SAINTS

Past Life Martyred Saints is the debut album from singer-guitarist EMA after the demise of her previous group Gowns. The seven minute opener Grey Ship leads in with a dirty chord progression played on a banged up acoustic guitar before her soft vocals chime in and sweep you into the dreamy soundscape which eventually builds into the song’s epic crescendo. The soaring guitar leads slice through but they only serve to heighten the tension. Her voice sounds bruised and fragile as she sings “great grandmother lived on the prairie, nothin and nothin and nothin and nothin, i got the same feeling inside of me”. The reason for the dark matter that characterises the album may stem from the circumstances surrounding the break up of Gowns, a band she also shared with her partner Ezra Buchla. Anteroom is a grungy folk number and is reminiscent of some of Nirvana’s acoustic forays whereas Milkman sits more on the industrial tip without losing its indie edge. Past Life Martyred Saints is a dark album but it’s not without its uplifting moments- uplifting in the manner that characterises blues music- and sonically the album retains a feel as though the instruments were recorded on a leaky old ship. EMA has dished out a whole lot of pain on this record but out of that she’s created a work of beauty.

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