Brimheim | Fables

Brimheim is back with her third album, Fables, in which the Danish-Faroese musician explores identity, change, and the human search for meaning through 12 songs. Drawing inspiration from 1970s singer-songwriters and a dreamy, organic soundscape, the album moves into a universe of symbolism, fairy-tale narratives, and unanswered questions.

Fables without clear answers

As children, fables taught us that even the most peculiar stories contain a moral, and that our actions have consequences we can learn from. But as we grow older, that simple perception of the world begins to seem more and more absurd.

It is precisely in this tension that Brimheim's third album, Fables, unfolds. Rather than Aesop's classic fables, the album brings to mind the enigmatic universe of Franz Kafka. The songs pique our urge to understand what it all means and how it ends, but gently let the answers slip out of reach.

Behind the artist name Brimheim is the Malmö-based Danish-Faroese musician Helena Heinsen Rebensdorff, who has a background in visual arts. Her stories are populated by characters, but without wagging fingers or clear-cut conclusions. Instead, she invites the listener into her own labyrinth, where mirrors, doorways, bells, and even a whale become symbols of a life in constant change.

"It's like when you dream that you're falling but never hit the ground," she says. "In dreams, you never reach anything definite. You are thrown into a scene, a story, a world where something is about to happen, and a choice must be made. But then you wake up, and you never get an ending."

From the storms of the Faroe Islands to 1970s songwriting

After a year of intensive touring in the wake of her second album, RATKING (2024), Brimheim felt burned out and needed new inspiration. Together with her songwriting partner Søren Buhl Lassen, she rented a small house on the Faroese island of Nólsoy.

Surrounded by the darkness of February and violent storms that could shake her out of her sleep, the songs began to take shape. The music took on an almost timeless and fairy-tale character, as if it were floating freely outside of time and place.

At the same time, Brimheim was undergoing major personal changes. After a misdiagnosis and nearly 15 years of debilitating medical treatment, she was in the process of tapering off antipsychotic and mood-stabilizing medication and finding her way back to herself. This experience also left clear marks on the music.

Brimheim had also lost interest in the electric guitar, and after a long period of musical experimentation, she and Buhl Lassen found inspiration in the more progressive singer-songwriter tradition of the 1970s.

Albums like Father John Misty's God's Favorite Customer and Loren Kramar's Glovemaker became important sources of inspiration, just as they delved into the music of Dory Previn, Judee Sill, Scott Walker, and Nick Drake.

"Through those albums and my exploration of those artists, I became interested in timelessness, both as a concept and as something to strive for aesthetically and sonically," Brimheim explains. "It's not the only musical direction on the album, but it became a major compass once I found what fascinated me."

Dark tales, symbolism, and human dilemmas

The lead single "My Collection" opens the door to Brimheim's peculiar universe with a good dose of dark humor. Here we meet a mysterious collector who attaches great value to discarded objects. She offers something precious, but only if the recipient acknowledges its value. Otherwise, the consequences can be fatal.

On "Sweet, Sweet Dark," the narrative becomes even more Faustian. Here, the darkness takes the form of a seductive, almost motherly figure who offers comfort and relief, but in return demands complete surrender.

Brimheim says that her songwriting has always felt most alive when she has been able to draw on the subconscious and the magical world of symbols and archetypes that humans seem to have a shared relationship with.

This is also expressed on "Girl at the Door," where a figure from her younger self appears and begins to tear her constructed life apart. But is she destroying something false or something valuable? As is often the case on Fables, the answer is left to the listener.

On "Somebody Else," which draws on classic, circular pop structures, the protagonist looks into a broken mirror and imagines a new face composed of the shards. Perhaps the point, if there is to be one at all, is that making yourself bigger is not necessarily the same as becoming whole.

A musical universe between folk, pop, and orchestral arrangements

The album's narratives are supported by a varied musical expression, where acoustic instruments, piano, and orchestral arrangements play central roles.

On "Deep Sea Creature," dynamic string arrangements inspired by Nick Drake's Five Leaves Left can be heard, while "Arsenic" explores the boundary between opposing intentions, where a bite turns into a kiss.

The album concludes with "Sainte-Chapelle (Paris, Baby)," where horn arrangements support a seemingly bright and uplifting mood. Everything beautiful seems to be within reach, but once again, Brimheim lets it slip away before it can be grasped.

On "iPad Glare," she moves out of the symbolic world of fairy tales and into a recognizable modern reality. The song revolves around how what gives us short-term comfort can eventually end up keeping us trapped.

With lively mellotron- and accordion-like passages inspired by the young Swiss musician Anatole Muster, the track is one of the closest Brimheim has come to a traditional folk dance so far. But beneath the immediately cheerful surface hides a longing for something greater, while the protagonist is stuck between the numbing effect of the screen and the feeling of a life outside.

Fables - An album about fear, change, and self-acceptance

Where classic fables often promise that fate will show us the way, Fables lets its characters wait. To be saved, for a sign, or simply to hear someone say: "You are good enough as you are."

But Brimheim does not leave them without agency. Even when they are stuck in fear, insecurity, and self-hatred, the stories contain the possibility to act and to change.

"You can't be brave without being afraid, and I have been so afraid," she says. "But it helps me to give those feelings a form outside of myself. Then I can take a step back, laugh at the absurdity, and meet them with a little kindness."

With Fables, Brimheim thus creates an album that does not try to provide simple answers to life's big questions, but instead finds beauty and meaning in uncertainty, change, and everything we do not yet understand.