Saba Lou’s backstory is almost too good to be true: a Berlin artist who stepped away from music to study biochemistry, then returned to write an album whose first songs are odes to a hydrogen electrode and UV light. “Nothing But Love,” the title track of her third album (out November 20 on Ernest Jenning), sounds exactly like someone who thinks in systems and feels in fragments — a beautiful indie-folk song that its own press describes as “shattered and glued back together,” and the description is spot on.

The track moves on a loose groove, piano wandering in and out of focus, Saba Lou’s vocal phrasing unpredictable in the best way — she lands where you don’t expect her to, and the song is more interesting for it. It’s more interesting than perfect, which is the whole point. Where a tidier songwriter would sand the edges off, Saba Lou leaves the cracks visible, and the light gets in through them.

Consequence picked it for their songs of the week, and it’s the kind of pick that rewards the Ten’s whole reason for existing: not the biggest song of the week, but one of the most singular. An album built from science and heartbreak, from electrodes and love songs, is a strange proposition. On the evidence of its title track, it’s going to be a wonderful one.

The album that follows this single promises to be just as singular. Nothing But Love arrives November 20, and its early songs reportedly include those odes to a hydrogen electrode and UV light — the sound of a songwriter who left music to study biochemistry and came back with a scientist’s eye for how things connect and a poet’s ear for how they feel. The title track sets the tone perfectly: not a thesis statement, but a mood, a loose groove and a vocal that refuses to behave predictably. If the rest of the record holds this standard, it will be one of the most quietly strange and affecting albums of the autumn.

Rating: 4.5/5

LISTEN

https://sabalou.bandcamp.com/album/nothing-but-love