Song For Our Daughter was released in early on April 10th, because according to the singer, she did not see the point of holding something back that, at a minimum could entertain, and at best, provide a feeling of sharing. This altruism is to its credit in line with the state of mind of this new opus.
For over ten years now Laura Marling has amazed me with her limpid folk, often stripped down and minimalist. The simple acoustic soundscape of the Laura’s musical beginnings has evolved over time. Her young voice, so thin, tinged with a veil of smoke, took on relief. We had already seen this delicious development in her latest album Semper Femina. Laura was devilishly sexy, feline, darker and more intriguing. Song For Our Daughter seems to mix these two universes. We find the particularly poetic songwriting of the young woman. Poetic but without bullshit, beware, it is 2020, Laura is not a pastoral country singer. She has both feet in our world and its current problems. Semper Femina evoked feminism and sorority. Here, Laura has abandoned first-person writing for the first time. The result is songs in the form of short stories. The themes are perhaps more universal but no less intimate.
Her stories are always touching, the words chosen are those that make you lift your nose from the book you read to just listen. She talks to her future daughter, defends her, wants to protect her innocence. She questions without judging the small marital prisons of our mothers. The Englishwoman knows how to be cynical when questioning whether the truth of her healed heart, expressed to her former lover, is not too bad to hear. You can hear this complicit and uncompromising smile in "Only The Strong". I like the complicity that it creates between her and me. Even if certain titles can evoke difficult moments in the life of a woman, the message here is that of the force, neither pathos, nor victim. For proof "Strange Girl" and it’s playful rhythm is the feel good song of the album. A declaration of love to all women, and an encouragement to be multiple, to live and not care!
