Molly Drag - Whatever Reason (2017)

Music has been known to break hearts. My heart breaks often, there are songs that are impossible for me to hear without associating them first with sadness. This is something music is good at: it brings us to places that are specific, no matter how hazy and dissonant the sound. Molly Drag–aka Michael Hansford–is a musician from Montreal who writes the kinds of songs that embody this lovely dissonance. On his newest album Whatever Reason, he gives us the noise we need to express those feelings of sadness and boredom so beautifully. Throughout the album’s eleven tracks, Hansford plays with lines of twinkling guitar, matched with interesting ambient synth samples and low fi production effects.