With a little help from her friend and tUnE-YaRdS mastermind Merrill Garbus, Chris Pureka‘s third LP, How I Learned To See In The Dark, burns with an intensity you rarely hear in the singer-songwriter/alt-country genre. Admittedly, we’re suckers for straightforward, strong chord progressions tinged with dissonant sounds around here, so it’s no wonder that Pureka cites 24B faves Ryan Adams and Josh Ritter as influences (“Lowlands,” in particular, recalls some of Ritter’s finest work).
I could go on an on about Pureka’s dusty voice and Garbus’ pitch-perfect production on this fine record, but fortunately you can get a taste for yourself for free today: Stream the Northampton, Massachusetts singer’s new tunes on MySpace and/or watch the exclusive premiere of Pureka’s new Melody Murray-directed music video for “Wrecking Ball” below: