Tamar Aphek

★★★ All Bets Are Off KILL ROCK STARS. CD/DL/LP

Heavy duty solo debut from ‘Israel’s guitar goddess’. Aphek had sung in a children’s choir, taken piano lessons and been educated at a music conservatory; then during her military service she heard Fugazi, Slint and Shellac, picked up a guitar, knocked hell out of it and folded in some languid jazz. A veteran of two bands, her solo outing is like an avenging Wonder Woman kicking out the jams, by turns furious and touching. Russian Winter surrounds Aphek’s sophisticated vocal with JCBsized reverb: “I’ll fight the Russian winter straight into your heart/You’ll say you can’t see blood but I plan to miss that part.” Then, with sleazy sax and off-kilter guitar, Show Me Your Pretty Side slinks on like a cross between P.J. Harvey and Morphine. Occasionally, the freeform dissonance breaks things down too much, but a hauntingly skewed take on As Time Goes By is worth sticking around for.