Music Crush: Nina Nastasia

Like Mirah, Nina Nastasia is an artist whom I think everyone should know because she is crazy talented. But at the same time I love that I don't have to share her with so many people.

Nina is one of very few artists who makes albums worth hearing in their entirety. She crafts songs from her intricate guitarwork and haunting vocals, frequent collaborator Jim White's distinct drums, and an eerie violin or two. The woman knows how to use a dramatic string section. Her lyrics sound like fables, nearly true tales set in a place both a part of and apart from the world that I know.

I never skip a track when listening to one of her records, and indeed I almost feel like I can't. She creates such intimate, spectral music that even the small spaces of silence between songs seem to jar me out of some spell she has cast. I keep coming back to her most recent album You Follow Me, which somehow feels like her biggest album even though it features the fewest instruments, and I always listen to her 2003 record Run to Ruin on repeat because it just gets under my skin.

Nina Nastasia - "Stormy Weather"