The Dark

Chelsea Wolfe has always been folk for metalheads. The Dark goes a step further and leans into the more conventional side of her songwriting and instrumentation. That might disappoint fans of her more avant-garde tendencies (my own Wolfe of choice is the trip-hop and synths of She Reaches Out to She Reaches Out to She), but it makes the album instantly accessible. Her most-streamed song is still “Flatlands”, an acoustic ballad from 2012’s Unknown Rooms, so this may well be the Chelsea Wolfe most people already know. The songs are melodic and easy to dive into, and her vocals are clear, confident and emotive. Highlights are the opener, “Cold”, which grows out of hushed vocals and acoustic guitar, and “Halo”, a post-apocalyptic love song stripped back almost to a demo (Wolfe says it was inspired by the first series of The Last of Us). It’s taken her nine albums to call one The Dark, which shows admirable restraint.