Laura Gibson’s Beast of Seasons is a gentle creature. Folk-inflected, guitar-led melodies thrum and cascade sweetly for the full length of the album. It’s pretty – but beautifully substantial stuff. Gibson has a voice that softly, quietly, gets under your skin.

She has contributed to The Dodo’s 2008 album Visitor and her vocals feature on many Portland bands’ releases over the past couple of years. This record is Gibson’s first full-length solo release in the UK. Written and recorded in Portland, the album was produced by Tucker Martine, who has worked with the Decemberists and Sufjan Stevens in the past. Other friends of Gibson such as Rachel Blumberg, who has drummed and sung with Bright Eyes, and solo artist Laura Veirs were involved in the recording too.

Divided in two parts, ‘Communion Songs’ and ‘Funeral Songs’, the record is consistently lovely and thought provoking . Sparse guitar, piano and violin arrangements accompany simple vocal phrases that surprise with lyrical richness. In striking tracks such as ‘Glory’ and ‘Where have all your good words gone?’, elliptical narratives mix with reflective meditations on life and love and relationships. There are hints of Leonard Cohen, Cat Power and Bright Eyes — but most of the time you feel you are listening to Gibson’s innermost deliberations; her thoughts set to music. Acoustic loveliness.

Nicole Farrell