Creatures is the lush, sprawling new album from Jolie Laide, a band who came together under some cool circumstances and have grown into a vibrant, unpredictable unit, revealing new dimensions for a group of seasoned musicians and writers. Their story is both the closing of a decades-old circle and one of the evolution of a quasi supergroup.

Comprised of revered American indie singer-songwriter Nina Nastasia (who has amassed a stunning and critically acclaimed discography of unique, darkly melodic albums), and Jeff MacLeod, Clinton St. John, and Morgan Greenwood (also of the band Florida BC), Jolie Laide planted its roots some two decades ago through a mutual connection. The lion's share of Nastasia's solo albums were masterfully recorded by the late, great Steve Albini, and in the mid-00s, MacLeod and St. John's old band The Cape May had just finished recording their album Glass Mountain Roads with the veteran engineer. Nina was next in line for the studio. A night of commiserating in the studio led to Albini’s suggestion that The Cape May become Nastasia’s touring band for her upcoming North American and European tours and this pairing turned into a fruitful collaboration and a longstanding friendship.

Announcing itself via a series of earthy thumps on a floor tom, Creatures opens wide with Nastasia's unmistakable voice, at once disarmingly sweet and laser-sharp. Jolie Laide is an intriguing way to hear the singer, who developed a tight, focused approach over the course of her active solo career. Here, she embraces sounds that would have been out of place on one of her own albums; on opener “Cheyenne”, Nastasia's voice swims in a swirl of delay trails, enveloped by a storm of overdubbed toms, and Clinton St. John's instantly evocative voice provides the perfect foil. “Holly”, a character study of two strangers rambling through a post-apocalyptic wasteland, is awash in beautiful cascades of affected electric guitars, imbuing a gently psychedelic glow to the song's edges, while remaining grounded in a more familiar dusty, percussive rhythm.

This sonic sea change may have something to do with one of the key elements that initially birthed this band. In early 2020, Kennan Gudjonsson, Nastasia's partner and longtime musical collaborator took his own life. This tragic and dislocating event took place right before the world found itself similarly unmoored as the COVID-19 pandemic. Looking for solace, Nastasia and MacLeod leaned on their deep friendship and shared songwriting obsession, throwing themselves into the remote recording sessions that became their self-titled 2023 debut. Nastasia found liberation in her new “band” environs: no longer the sole focal point, and working with a new set of parameters for how her music could sound and exist in the world, Jolie Laide provided something of a revelation.

Reflecting on the impressive scope of Creatures, MacLeod says, “the album plays like a mix tape”, citing its deep range (folk to spaghetti westerns to post-punk to sludge to electronic pop) of sonic approaches. Fittingly, as their name translates to ugly/pretty, the band’s stories find grace and beauty in the imperfect. Powerfully poetic, often anthemic, narratives soar over Greenwood and MacLeod’s layered multi-instrumental wizardry. Making good on that description, “Something For The Thrill” takes a mid-album left-turn, delivering a veritable rock song, complete with thick, hairy guitars, heavy drumbeat and brash, pissed-off sounding vocals. But within the menace, there is that sweet melodic aspect cutting the hard edge, and the song is once again a testament to these singers’ inspired pairing, with the duet being the through line of Creatures. Despite how different some of these songs feel to each other, and indeed to Jolie Laide's 2023 debut, the instantly recognizable voices of Nina Nastasia and Clinton St. John tie everything together.

The astute observer might notice a strong uptick in the electronic realm on Creature, most clearly in the album’s brilliant one-two of cautionary dystopian nightmares, with “No Shape I Know” and “Small Things”, boasting the album’s most wearily hopeful, soaring choruses. Indeed, the album is replete with warm synths and uniquely textured drum machine patterns, and largely attributed to producer and multi-instrumentalist Morgan Greenwood who was invited wholesale into the fold for some of their first shows in 2023. Greenwood (ex- Baths, Azeda Booth), who cut his teeth on Boards of Canada and Aphex Twin, was warmly encouraged to liberally apply his sensibilities to the record – as was producer/engineer Colin Stewart, who oversaw the production at his studio, the fabled Hive Creative Labs. “The majority of this record was written in the studio,” MacLeod says, “and Colin took on the traditional producer role, becoming essentially a fifth member, providing direction and ideas.”

Another album highlight, “Wharwolf” is a tour de force of ideas and shifting moods; beginning with intricately programmed drum sequences and a plaintive, bleak vocal from St. John, it crashes into an epic wall of guitars and propulsive drumming, before uncannily sliding into a glistening calm after the storm, Nastasia's reverb-drenched voice floating amidst sparse webs of guitar. The whole thing unquestionably hangs together, but it's a hell of a ride. MacLeod says that “the song was originally demoed in a fairly traditional manner,” but after the band opted for a more unique approach, “we completely dropped it to the studs and rebuilt it, spending days in the studio tinkering,” and it paid dividends.

Elsewhere, “Murder Ballad”, while confronting the notion that ghosts might actually exist even if god doesn’t, skews closer to Florida BC territory. Fronted by St. John and continuing the long line of bands he and MacLeod have helmed (including The Cape May and Pale Air Singers), Florida BC has spent the last number of years carving their own niche, one that radiates a similarly unmistakable feeling as Nastasia's. But here, MacLeod's gently brushed, loping drums and St. John's signature emotive drawl are buffered by Nastasia's equally world-weary vocals, and one could be forgiven for asking “what took so long?”

Looking back on the trajectory from Jolie Laide's self-titled debut to the brand new Creatures, it's anyone's guess where this group will go next. For fans of Nina Nastasia or the Florida BC band family, there's plenty of both of those things, but there's also a whole new, unified thing; with Creatures they're presenting it in widescreen.