Portland singer/songwriter Faustina Masigat just released her self-titled debut LP through Mama Bird Recording Co., the local record label that’s also home to up-and-coming musicians like Haley Heynderickx and Courtney Marie Andrews who’ve been getting attention beyond the Pacific Northwest. Masigat has, too—in a recent review, the Washington Post called her “a singular voice.”
But her new album was the product of some darker days. When she wrote it, Masigat remembers feeling like a failure—anchorless, lost, and the kind of sad that isn’t easily escaped. Across 11 tracks, she sings about being broke and heartbroken (“Poverty”), reflects on waning love that’s “like a cold bath” (“Intervention”), and eulogizes her old life (“I Was His”). They’re ballads from rock bottom, that impossible state of mind where every direction seems like a dead-end.
“If you’re struggling with a hard situation or if you have mental illness, it tricks you into thinking that you’ve always felt that way and you’ll never feel better,” Masigat says. “[But] if I don’t process this, I’m going to be stuck in this place indefinitely.”