A favourite of John Peel and Laura Marling, Nina Nastasia gave up music as she endured a controlling partner and botched drug therapy – then even greater tragedy struck. After 12 years away, she returns with a tough, beautiful album
• This interview contains discussions of domestic abuse and suicide
In early April, Nina Nastasia was preparing for her first live dates in a decade, supporting Mogwai in the US. She felt nervous, having never planned a tour alone, and overwhelmed about playing for people again. A friend reassured her that, as she was the opener, nobody would really be listening. “I was relieved,” says Nastasia. “But then I thought, ‘Well, wait a minute, nobody’s gonna listen? I want people to listen.’”
The audience was “completely silent” for her sets, says Mogwai’s Stuart Braithwaite. Nastasia’s friend underestimated how sorely fans wanted this beloved songwriter back. Between 2000 and 2010, her catalogue struck a hair-raising balance between hope and melancholy, elegance and earthiness – popularised by the fervent support of John Peel. Steve Albini recorded all her albums, and considers them among his proudest work. Laura Marling calls 2007’s You Follow Me “an example of how to do something so straightforward as recording a songwriter differently”, and a mysterious record that “speaks in symbols directly to the soul”.
