Hardships!

The second album from Swede Jenny Wilson is a little tricky to unravel, but nevertheless has its moments.

While Love and Youth wasn't exactly light listening, it could be reasonably mentioned somewhat in the same breath as Wilson's friends and collaborators (and compatriots) Robyn and the Knife; Hardships! though, plods a portentous path far from the Scandinavian synth pop superhighway, evoking instead the idiosyncratic likes of Kate Bush and Tori Amos.

Hardships! is a defiant statement and one of the best albums to be released this year, despite the fact that it technically comes from 2009.