Norm

It's an album that further solidifies his position as a genre-leading storyteller, and it will have you humming along as much as it'll have you looking over your shoulder.

Upon first listen, “Norm” is a gorgeously produced collection of short folk-fiction. When given closer attention, the album unfurls into an anthology of dark, interconnected tales of loss, unrequited love and casual brushes with the divine.

What could have been merely clever becomes soulful and poignant thanks to Shauf's understated vocals, his eye for mundane details and flourishes. [Mar 2023, p.35]

The artist’s stories work as not-quite-parables, with no message tumbling through and pushing everything along, but certainly asking the listener to spend time with whatever part of themselves they see in the twists and turns. And even when it’s hard, Shauf’s music makes self-reflection a temptation too inviting to resist.

His eighth album, Norm, is his most meticulous and beguiling, straying from his semi-autobiographical past work to span three perspectives and tactfully downplaying its philosophical quandaries with his lushest arrangements to date.