Kevin Bronson on February 20th, 2013

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Pam Shaffer makes chamber-pop for dimly lit chambers. The meditations on her second album, the fan-funded “It Is Happening Again” (out this week) seem to materialize from the shadows of a roomful of old things, illuminated only by a single candle. Piano, guitar, strings and Shaffer’s plaintive vocals conspire to draw slow-mo vignettes on “Orpheus” and “Remember This;” a feistier, rocker side materializes on the slow-building “Heliotrope” and “Drowning.” Shaffer found collaborators in Micah Nelson (Willie Nelson’s band), Nikita Sorokin and guitarist Milo Gonzalez (both Lucent Dossier) and Michael Anthony Ibarra (Killsonic), and together with David Peters’ studio work, “It Is Happening Again” make for compelling theater.

||| Stream: “Remember This” and “Heliotrope”:

Photo by Zoe-Ruth Erwin