Afterlight

★★★★ Afterlight

AFTERLIGHT. CD/DL

The horror of domestic abuse laid painfully bare, by Thea Gilmore’s new alias.

After 19 albums recorded under her own name, English singersongwriter Thea Gilmore has reinvented herself as Afterlight. The catalyst for the change is not a pleasant one; for years, she says, she has been the victim of sustained domestic abuse. In spite of its redemptive title,

Afterlight reveals in painful detail the physical and mental ordeal she has hidden for too long. Whether she’s being direct on Of All The Violence I Have Known (“I’ve known the harm of a hand through the air… the tightening of a fist in my hair”) or more oblique for 26 Letters (“26 letters to tell you I’m scared”), it’s heartbreaking and shocking. There is too much horror in these songs to unpack with the requisite care here, and sadly

Afterlife will speak deeply to far too many women (and men). But with luck, it will also give them hope and courage.