Josephine Foster: Domestic Sphere (Fire/digital outlets)

As many would realise, Elsewhere sometimes looks very far afield and elsewhere in its choices: we suspect few other webmags would give space to the sui generis and idiosyncratic sounds of noemienours, Mali Mali, Jandek, John Jacob Niles, Hasil Adkins . . .

Let alone have a whole section called Further Outwhere.

The music there make Yoko Ono and the Shaggs positively top 40 contenders.

And so we come again to the quirky, acquired taste of Josephine Foster whose previous albums we have introduced, and whose last one No Harm Done we considered had considerable charm and seductions.

That is despite Foster – who aimed for an operatic career but became a funeral singer and now performs on lo-fi guitars – often sings in a style of no particular melodic direction.

We think of her – wrongly, which is why we run this photo – as some strange spinster or Miss Haversham in a 19^thcentury parlour or retirement home where she entertains with her child-like songs and high voice.

The title of this album – but not the rustic setting on the cover – plays into that idea. It opens with Entrance which consists of bird calls, or someone making them, footsteps before she sings and then there are odd animal noises, unless that is her too.

Halfway through there's an interlude with bird calls (Entr'acte).

With just her voice and electric guitar, she sings tender and gentle folk for the living and those who have gone before (the lovely Birthday Song for the Dead). It is like eavesdropping on a séance, one song is entitled Haunted House.

Domestic Sphere is eerie (Shrine Excerpt), lovely, mysterious, gentle, slightly disturbing but also full of strange enchantment.

Unless you have tuned in to Josephine Foster previously – probably through Elsewhere – we can confidently say you won't have heard anything quite like her.

A unique artist.

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You can hear this album at Spotify here.