The Crying Light

iTunes Review

Few vocalists can command such authority with such fragility. Antony Hegarty uses his emotionally volatile voice to definitively deliver his questions to the universe where everyone is suffering from some sort of psychic displacement and the dead float nearer to the surface than most can imagine. 2009's The Crying Light, his third album, features somber piano notes drifting into the ether, cellos that stretch their passages to the breaking point, and other orchestrations that emphasize a world where everything is approaching if not crisis, then a breaking point of sublime majesty. Even a track named "Daylight and the Sun" uses dramatic shadows to make its point. "Another World" calls out like a prayer for something greater than we can imagine. "Her Eyes Are Underneath the Ground" focuses on the dead. "Aeon" is virtually a rocker, using electric guitars and organ and even drums to kick into what could almost be called a soulful strut. "Everglade" emerges as sunlight breaking over the darkest dawn with its swelling brass and strings. In the end, it's Hegarty's voice, a true natural wonder, pulling the pieces together.