ComfortComes

Hanne Hukkelberg – Blood from a Stone

Hanne Hukkelberg’s music is empoweringly visual and dramatic. Hanne, known for her experimentation with sound, keeps with this unique style for her latest album Blood from a Stone. Using everyday objects such as freezers and stoves to accompany her beautiful voice, Blood from a Stone is a continuation in the “found objects” genre of art.

The music itself progresses from light to heavy with the last track feeling almost like a slow funeral dirge. My favorite tracks are the ones the come early on the album. The title track, Blood from a Stone (second on the roster), is particularly light and moving. Reminiscent of a kid skipping hopscotch squares on a hot summer day. Endearing lyrics bring this childlike feeling to the surface as well. “Through my heart-shaped heart,” was just one clever phrase that I enjoyed.

However, I wrestled with the rest of the album. Heavy and almost dreary, the later tracks on the album challenged me to find a point of connection. That’s when I started thinking about the movies. Wouldn’t some of those later tracks make a great film score?

In thinking this, I wonder if it means that I feel like something is missing from the music. Why should I need these visual images to add to the music that should stand on it’s own? But I think it simply speaks to the great creative power of music. Just like remembering where I was the first time I heard my favorite song, what I was wearing and what I was doing, Hanne Hukkelberg’s Blood from a Stone inspired me to imagine. And what greater compliment can you give art?

All of this is to say that Blood from a Stone is not my idea of casual listening music. However, it caught my attention the way that a film soundtrack would. Beautiful in its drama and invention, this is an album I’ll remember in the more extreme times of my life.

By Eva Gross