Hannah Wicklund has been traveling fast and far, playing big cities and small towns around the world since starting her band at 8 years old. With her new album, Produced by Sam Kiszka, she is now arriving somewhere completely unexpected. Ethereal texturing, smokey falsetto vocals, string section surprises and guitar solos that carry equal parts pain and joy are woven tastefully into what Wicklund says is, “A record that just sounds like me.” Much like Hannah’s paintings she has become known for, each song is intricately entrancing and honored with two things seemingly lost in today’s world….patience and time. With Sam Kiszka on bass/keys/organ and Danny Wagner on drums, both of Greta Van Fleet, the songs serve as a rock ’n' roll roadmap to a crossroads that Wicklund has been unknowingly gravitating towards for well over a decade. X marks the spot where the weary girl speeding towards the woman she will become meet in a fiery head-on collision. On this album, we hear from the woman rising from that wreckage. The woman who’s scarred but smarter, holds compassion for the girl who carried her here, and with wide-open clear eyes, unflinchingly stares down the future.
Indeed, The Prize is a beautiful representation of what raw feminine power and determination look, feel and sound like. Carved with pain during the most wounded and fragile point in our young heroine’s life, this record is for anyone that has ever had to look inward to move onward. “This album was so radically healing for me, and I hope it can inspire and perhaps play a role in someone else’s story” says Wicklund. “I want us all to remember, it can be lonely and is never easy ‘doing the work’, but we are each worthy of our own love, time, and dedication.”
