Bella Hardy: Hey Sammy review – indie pop and math-rock rhythms from folk stalwart

Once upon a time, Bella Hardy was a Radio 2 award-winning folk singer, folding her bright, Judy Collins vowels around tales of cruel mothers and trawlermen’s wives. Ten years after her debut album Night Visiting she’s a different creature entirely, her new album swerving between Radio 2-friendly pop and the melodic fringes of post-rock, its lyrics inspired by feminism, racism, and her international travels (she’s spent the last two years in Nashville and China). It was produced by Paul Savage, who has worked with the Delgados and Mogwai, and the alternative legacies of those bands seep into the sounds surrounding these songs, especially in the math-rock guitar rhythms on Driving Through Harmony and the ambient reverb on Stars. Hardy also reimagines folk ballad Tam Lin into the sultry Queen Carter’s Bar, and You Don’t Owe the World Pretty has a sweet message for girls, despite its slightly heavy handed lyrics. This is an accessible, mainstream proposition however, reaching out, standing tall.