Law Holt - City (2016)

Law Holt finally bestows her debut LP upon us and, boy, is it magnificent. Astute Edinburgh listeners will know her from collabs with Young Fathers, but we're only here to talk about Law: underwater pop music heard through a crackling, long-distance line, City makes a claustrophobic, sticky summer sound totally fresh.

Holt’s gigantic vocals arrive drenched in woozy, confusing feedback – the kind of disorientating aural mess that would drown out anyone less mighty. Her ear for a melody is uncanny, and the record’s first five tracks are perfect, oddball pop songs built on bricks of twisted, hazy beats, but it’s on City’s darker, denser cuts that Holt shows off the scope of her introspective imagination. On single Spit, she half-croons, half-shouts 'I’m always alone, on my own / I’m always alone, on my phone' as the ceiling collapses and the walls cave in.

Stories of could-have-beens and missed connections slide alongside sultry, straight-talk warnings about what’ll happen if you sleep on this: 'Think twice baby, ‘cause there’s other boys / Talking ‘bout me.' Take note.