New Music: Ana Caravelle – “Where Have You Been?”

Ana Caravelle’s music reminds me of White Hinterland’s Phylactery Factory — well, actually, it reminds me of a brief, tumultuous couple of weeks in 2007 when she was going by the name Anahita Navab and I was hooking up with her roommate. (Small world. I was, of course, terrifically young and confused and sad that year, which is probably enough biography.) But Caravelle’s music does remind me of White Hinterland’s dark whimsy and, due to the harp being her chosen instrument, Joanna Newsom. On “Where Have You Been,” she sings, “The coyotes have gone wild again” with a Newsom-like affect, but the song soon revels in harmonies and darker vocal tones more akin to Mia Doi Todd’s wondrous alto. The arrangements are another effort entirely, horns and strings diving in and out with the shadowy elusiveness of ships in the night. It’s a magnetic first effort; Caravelle’s debut album, Basic Climb, marks her ascent into singer-songwriter importance on Sept. 28. She plays the Bootleg Theater on Oct. 10.

Ana Caravelle – “Where Have You Been?”: mp3

(Basic Climb is due Sept. 28 on Non Projects; photo by Spencer Lowell)