A high-profile player on New York’s no wave scene of the late ’70s, Lydia Lunch went on to pursue spoken-word performance, underground film work, photography and academic lecturing. Music, however, has always been her first love. Smoke In The Shadows is Lunch’s first LP since 1999 and may be the best thing she’s done in years. Seedy but understated narratives are given noir-ish, jazz-lounge settings, and her trademark nihilistic shrieks are nowhere to be heard.
Barry Adamson explores similar territory, but there are plenty of twists in Lunch’s seductive tales and, with “Trick Baby”, she even tries her hand at rap.