Aoife Nessa Frances: Land of No Junction review – adventures beyond the crossroads

When the world around you is ever changing and the ground under your feet always shifting, how can you pin a moment and express it? Living in a constant state of flux, Dublin-based singer-songwriter Aoife Nessa Frances finds the words, melodies and emotions that bind the comings and goings of being a young woman in Ireland.

With a rich voice that comes in heavy like a mudslide, Frances draws you into her centre and moves you with her. Over gentle guitar, the former Princess member uses Blow Up to capture a breaking point in life when you know that everything must change but you have to go beyond your comfort zone to progress.

As the strings on Here in the Dark swell, she finds strength in uncertainty and comfort in solitude, and on the mild-1960s jangle of Libra, she unravels the hypocrisies of love.

With almost all of the lyrics on her debut album penned down in a free-writing process, her points meander, but the title track concludes that even if you don’t know where you’re going, it’s essential that you trudge onwards.