I see Nina Nastasia has a new album. Fantastic.

What I like about her music is its simplicity and clarity, but also its total fvck-you hardness. I’ve never heard another singer like her. I haven’t heard anything from On Leaving yet, but if it’s anything like the other 3 albums, I won’t be disappointed. She has this style, with a voice so clear and clean you could scour your bath with it, similar to Kristin Hersh’s as she has the same measured, not-a-note-wasted tone and song structure - her songs are somehow both oblique yet beautifully observed and tender, and have a kind of hardworking, straight-backed ethic about them that sets her apart from the emoters, the wailers, the life’s-too-muchers.

Take a listen to this, preferably as loud as you can - I Say That I Will Go, from her last album, Run To Ruin; a tiny glance of softness at the end gives more of a clue as to what’s going on, but by then the music’s crowded in so much, then receded, it’s disorientating and gorgeous to be stuck in the middle of it.

So yes, Dermot’s thrilled that Nina Nastasia’s got a new album out.