Clara Engel is an experimental, post-punk artist from Montreal who puts together songs full of textures and atmosphere. Songs like “Lick My Fins” (below) are challenging, evoking as they do anything from cabaret punk to Siouxsie and the Banshees… even hints of Annie Lennox and Patti Smith. It’s a challenging, but ultimately rewarding, listen to an artist that is clearly driven by an inner poetry that burns from the inside-out.
The great testament to the highly original nature of Clara’s music is my complete inability to find any sort of description that feels appropriate. One of her many albums – Secret Beasts – feels at times tortured, and at others calmly spiritual. It’s a mystery, and, honestly, I feel unfit to reduce it to the constraints of a review. (And actually, that does feel like a compliment to me.)