Nadia Reid

Preservation (The Label)

There’s something otherworldly about Nadia Reid, with her haunted, rich voice, the dense, reverb-laden sound that fills her records, and her shy, bespectacled persona. It’s this enigmatic feeling that runs deeply through Preservation, Reid’s second album. And what an album it is. Preservation may even be better than her debut – Listen to Formation, Look for the Signs – with a thick, echoey sound and wonderfully melodic, intelligent tunes. Most of the songs ease along, with gentle finger-picking guitar accompanied by subtle drumming, and Sam Taylor’s gritty, fluttery guitar work. It’s relentlessly pretty, if often melancholic. Kicking off with the wistful title track, it winds its way through tales of people and places from Reid’s past and present. There’s Richard, about a man ‘‘who liked the sound of his own voice’’; the dark Te Aro, touching on her time in (as she says) brutally windy Wellington; the beautiful, catchy I Come Home To You. Lead single Arrow and the Aim is aggressively dark, its purposely messy production cut through with Reid’s clear voice. It’s fiery, powerful, and moving. She is one of New Zealand’s most distinctive and finest young songwriters. – Jack Barlow