Laura Welsh - Unravel

Dev Hynes, man of a million projects, has a certain sombre way with pop music. He makes it soft and malleable, with beats that tug listlessly at your limbs and a softly-strummed, slowly-intensifying pleading. Songs that he touches always sound like the light and frothy protestations of someone scared to admit to feeling too much, but quiver with a palpable fragility that suggests more than meets the eye, or ear.

This tongue-biting production style meets its match in the astounding new talent that is London-based singer-songwriter Laura Welsh on her debut single for Luv Luv Luv, Unravel. Her 2012 track Hollow Drum revealed her as a voice capable of delicate yet powerful strokes, tensely tip-toeing over a creeping melody and expertly gliding between volumes, pitches and inflections. She’s got a way of wringing everything that she can out of a line, but never makes it feel overdone, making her the perfect counterpoint to Hynes’s danceable sadness.

The downcast love song is available to download on Welsh’s Facebook page, as well as streaming below.