Marta Pérez

Catalan singer-songwriter Marta Pérez has been unfolding a solo career distilled over years with care. Back & Forth, her first LP released by Great Canyon Records — home to internationally recognized artists such as Joana Serrat, and Riders Of The Canyon — was produced by Jordi Bastida (Sidonie, Alizzz, Rigoberta Bandini), who also recorded electric and acoustic guitars throughout. The album is an exercise in expanded intimacy. The songs unfurl like leaves in light. The arrangements breathe; moments of serene folk alternate with broader tonalities, evoking the emotional lines of indie-folk artists, yet keeping Pérez’s distinct voice. According to the artist, Back & Forth is “a blend of nostalgia, melancholy, and hope; a compendium combining longing for the past with an eye toward a radiant future.” Drawing on imagined lives — with occasional ties to reality — the album unfolds in two parts: Letters for June, the first four songs (mixed by Joan Pons, El Petit de Cal Eril), express nostalgia, while Letters from June, the remaining five tracks, embrace hope and new possibilities. Marta Pérez shows the same care for language as great introspective writers. Her world echoes Joni Mitchell’s free-flowing melodies, Louise Glück’s luminous depth, and meticulous attention to emotion and nature reminiscent of Sylvia Plath, Emily Dickinson, and Virginia Woolf’s inner journeys. You may enjoy this album if you like Laura Veirs, Julia Jacklin, Big Thief, Florist, or Laura Marling.