After a politically engaged third album released three years ago (Future Politics), Katie Stelmanis, the brain behind Austra, has gone for a different approach on HiRUDiN, locking herself up for three days in a studio in Toronto with musicians she had never met before, including part of the contemporary music improv group c_RL, the duo Kamancello (a cello and a kamanche) and an all-female kulintang ensemble (a Filipino percussion musical instrument). Having become a kind of LGBT+ indie icon, Katie Stelmanis opens up a little more on this album and deals with more intimate themes such as the consequences of toxic relationships and insecurities linked to her sexuality. The new wave influence is also more drawn-out in the orchestration which is imbued with classical touches (her passion when she was younger), carried mostly by the cello and piano. More pop than synth, like the first Supertramp-esque track Anyways, Austra releases a flock of powerful hits (Risk It, with its broken beat and cello skank, the catchy It's Amazing, Mountain Baby with its children's choir or the danceable I Am Not Waiting) which could well send her up a level. © Smaël Bouaici/Qobuz