An old acquaintance of mine recently reached out to tell me about this great record they found in their uncle’s vinyl collection that featured production from none other than the great Ryuichi Sakamoto. This record was Virginia Astley’s 1986 record Hope In A Darkened Heart, which also happens to feature additional work from Japan’s David Sylvian. Hope is a lovely dream pop record, harkening parallels to Julee Cruise, Cocteau Twins and Kate Bush to more modern examples like Julia Holter. It’s a lovely record and I’m VERY grateful that that person reached out and told me about it.