Notes: Personnel: Orion Rigel Dommisse (electric cello); Greg Weeks (guitar); Jesse Sparhawk (harp); Robert Pycior (electric violin); Margie Wienk (cello). The debut album by singer/songwriter Orion Rigel Dommisse is an unusual singer/songwriter disc, poised somewhere between classical music and art song, with some folky elements as well. Its prime audience will probably be indie rock listeners, but in some senses there's little rock on the record, as there's almost nothing in the way of guitar and...

On the surface Orion Rigel Dommisse’s song world is marked by death, desolation and personal disaster. That the events populate a fairy-tale-like terrain is no small point. The transmutation of terror and dread into a manageable folkloric currency makes complete sense given the fantastic elements sewn within Orion’s singular visions. As with the best fantasy tales, Orion’s songs thread multiple meanings, some obvious, others occluded, through a linear narrative of disarming depth. All the while the tone is...