Back in 2016, little-known lo-fi singer-songwriter Jasmine Cruickshank was picked by US artist Lucy Dacus to open her European tour; in the same year, Dacus met her future Boygenius bandmate Julien Baker. Almost a decade later, things came full circle when Dacus turned her other Boygenius pal, Phoebe Bridgers, on to the music of the Manchester-based artist now known as jasmine.4.t, who promptly became the first UK signing to Bridgers’s label Saddest Factory (also home to Muna and Claud). All three members of Boygenius co-produced Cruickshank’s forthcoming debut album, You Are the Morning.
The record sprang out of a challenging period for Cruickshank. “My first EP [2019’s Worn Through] came out pre-transition, and then I got really sick during Covid and transitioned while having long Covid,” she told Rolling Stone. “I left an abusive marriage and was homeless for a period after I wasn’t accepted by my family.”
You Are the Morning explores the transformative elements of that time: the liberation of finally walking through the world as herself, the joy of a first queer relationship, and the friends and communities that supported Cruickshank through it all. Stretching from the sparse, sorrowful string arrangements of Highfield to lead single Skin on Skin’s gnarled, biting electric guitars, with standout Elephant recalling the experimental indie-rock of the Microphones, it is a gorgeously written debut.
• You Are the Morning is released on 17 January (Saddest Factory). jasmine.4.t plays Leeds, Kingston and London, 17-19 January
