Released on September 9, 2011
Laura Marling’s third album, A Creature I Don’t Know, reveals the young musician’s upbeat side and strays from her signature melancholic folk sound. Tracks like “I Was Just a Card” have ‘90s soft rock influences, warming her sound and making the album a little more accessible for anyone that found her previous two albums a little too morbid. However, for fans of her earlier work, tracks like “Night after Night” will somewhat satiate any desire for soft acoustic guitar and sobering lyrics.
Upon hearing her first album, it’s easy to assume Laura Marling is a seasoned musician, maybe around her ‘40s, because of the intense emotional depth and maturity of her lyrics. Musically, the same could be said for A Creature I Don’t Know, but much of the album’s lyrical content is comparatively abstract, lacking that emotionally charged Marling from earlier work. It is a pleasant album to listen to, but as a collective piece of work, not especially memorable.
