Julianna Barwick and Mary Lattimore dropped their first full-length collaboration, Tragic Magic, on January 16, 2026. Barwick has built a strong reputation in ambient circles with her vocal-looping approach, turning single phrases into dense, choral-like arrangements on standout records like Nepenthe and Healing Is a Miracle. Lattimore, meanwhile, has pushed the harp into experimental territory through solo releases such as Goodbye, Hotel Arkada and Hundreds of Days, often layering effects for drifting, introspective pieces. Both artists trace their starts to Southern backgrounds like Barwick drawing from church acoustics and loop pedals after moving to Brooklyn, Lattimore from classical harp training in North Carolina hills. Now Los Angeles residents, they’ve crossed paths on tracks and stages since 2019, leading to this project recorded in nine intensive days at Paris’s Musée de la Musique, accessing rare historic instruments.
The record kicks off with ‘Perpetual Adoration’, a slow-building blend of Lattimore’s resonant harp plucks and Barwick’s sustained, heavily reverbed vocal syllables that hang in the air. From there, it gains momentum: ‘The Four Sleeping Princesses’ layers minimal harp figures with growing synth textures and overlapping voices that shift into chaotic swells. ‘Temple of the Winds’, penned by Roger Eno, contrasts sharp, isolated harp attacks with Barwick’s diffuse, wandering lines. A reworked ‘Rachel’s Song’, pulling from Vangelis’s Blade Runner soundtrack, incorporates sampled rainfall, while ‘Stardust’ stretches into seven-minute kosmische zones with pulsing analog synths, quick harp passages, and processed vocals that feel detached and otherworldly.
Tied to the timing of the January 2025 California wildfires that hit close to home for both, the album carries subtle threads of disruption and recovery. That added rain element in ‘Rachel’s Song’ marks the real downpour that followed the fires, news that reached them mid-session. At its core, the set captures straightforward room interplay, two distinct voices syncing up without excess. 
Across early listens and critical takes, Tragic Magic stands out for how tightly Barwick and Lattimore’s approaches merge into a single, flowing entity, reviewers note the effortless “musical telepathy” from their long friendship, yielding tracks that balance closeness with wide-open space. The result is a comforting ambient whole that turns personal hardship into shared solace, peaking in the raw urgency of ‘Melted Moon’ and its direct nod to rebuilding.
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