About this artist
A singer/songwriter whose ethereal vocals and personal lyrics are well-suited to her spare, tender indie folk, Australia’s Indigo Sparke made her recording debut with the Nightbloom EP in 2016. Her first album, 2021′s echo, was co-produced with Big Thief’s Adrianne Lenker and Andrew Sarlo. She adopted a more expansive, layered sound with more muscular guitars for the Aaron Dessner-produced Hysteria, which arrived the following year.
Born in Sydney to a pair of musicians, Sparke was named after Duke Ellington’s “Mood Indigo.” Raised on music including perceptible influences Joni Mitchell and Neil Young, she attended a performing arts high school and went to acting school before turning to music, taking up the guitar in her early twenties. She quickly became an active member of the regional music scene and released her first EP, Nightbloom, in 2016. A tour of Australia in support of Big Thief kicked off in 2017, and Sparke made her South by Southwest debut and toured the U.S. in 2019.
Recorded in Italy, Los Angeles, and Figure 8 Studio in New York City, Sparke’s debut album, echo, was co-produced by Sparke, Adrianne Lenker, and Andrew Sarlo and engineered and mixed by another frequent Big Thief crew member, Phil Weinrobe. It arrived on Sacred Bones in early 2021. She was based in New York by the time she completed work on the more richly arranged, electrified follow-up. Produced with Aaron Dessner (the National, Taylor Swift), Hysteria saw release in late 2022. ~ Marcy Donelson