Marissa Nadler

For over two decades, Marissa Nadler has carved out a singular place in the musical landscape, where ethereal folk, shadowy Americana, ambient soundscapes, shoegaze and experimental textures converge. Anchored by her unmistakable mezzo-soprano and intricate fingerstyle guitar, Nadler’s music conjures vivid emotional worlds—intimate, otherworldly, and timeless.

A prolific songwriter, Nadler has built a discography defined by spectral beauty and haunting lyricism. Her songs, dreamlike and lush, are rich with painterly imagery and emotional nuance. As The New Yorker writes, “To luxuriate in the spectral croon of Marissa Nadler is to step into a noirish world of mystery and glamour,” while AllMusic praises her “epic, aching songs, which refuse to keep tragedy at arm's length.”

Shortly after earning her bachelors and masters degrees from the Rhode Island School of Design, Nadler released her breakthrough debut Ballads of Living and Dying (2004), a collection that announced her as a major voice in the underground. A skilled visual artist as well, Nadler’s background in painting and drawing deeply informs the cinematic scope of her songwriting.

Following her early releases, she partnered with Sacred Bones and Bella Union for July (2014), marking a new chapter in both creative clarity and critical acclaim. Albums like Strangers (2016), For My Crimes (2018), and The Path of the Clouds (2021) further expanded her sonic palette while preserving the deep emotional resonance at the core of her work. As Brooklyn Vegan notes, “Just about everything she puts out is truly mesmerizing.” 

A frequent collaborator, Nadler has worked across genres with a wide spectrum of artists—from Cocteau Twins’ Simon Raymonde to John Cale, Angel Olsen, Mary Lattimore, Xasthur, and The Kronos Quartet.

Her tenth full-length album, New Radiations, arrives August 15th. Expansive, melodic, and emotionally vivid, it captures Nadler at her most personal and visionary—an artist continually evolving, yet unmistakeable.