All her life, Emma Hardyman has wrestled with contradictions. After all, she waspractically rendered a living, breathing contradiction the moment she was born into herhalf-Peruvian, half-white working-class Mormon family. In young adulthood, Hardymanbecame increasingly disillusioned with Mormonism's righteous black-and-white thinking,as well as it's exclusionary elitism, and decided to leave the church. But she alsoacknowledged that the institution's all-or-nothing philosophy had become a part of her,resulting in a considerable test of grace and unlearning.As the singer-songwriter behind Little Moon, the Tiny Desk Contest-winning,Utah-based avant-folk project, Hardyman uses music as an outlet to illuminatecontradictions of all kinds. Following the release of her 2020 debut LP Unphased,Hardyman set out to write a romantic album about her newlywed husband Nathan (whoalso sings and plays guitar in Little Moon), but the universe had other plans. AfterNathan's mother tragically passed away, Hardyman recalibrated her vision and startedwork on a love-as-grief, grief-as-love album titled Dear Divine. The record serves as amirror for the darkest parts of ourselves, allowing us to examine our ego-not todismantle it, but to better understand how we love, process adversity and move throughthe world.Centering the classical music, folk, video game soundtracks and Tabernacle Choirhymns she grew up with, as well as ephemeral snapshots of personal significance, DearDivine is an abundant tapestry of Hardyman's life. As enlivening melodies radiate from astring trio, you can envision the classical music that thrums from her parents' radio 24/7,as Hardyman sings in an otherworldly coo, you can imagine her younger self swooningover the tranquil records of Vashti Bunyan and Joan Baez, and as arpeggiated synthstwinkle, you can visualize the enchanting kingdom of Hyrule from The Legend of Zelda:Ocarina of Time that she still adores.Songs like "now" and "messy love" embrace the gloriously jumbled stew of life, with theformer chronicling Hardyman's arduous quest for love and trust and the latter patientlynavigating the ways romantic partners can mirror each other's shortcomings. As DearDivine attests, Emma Hardyman may not have it all figured out, but that's kind of thepoint. Through grief, faith crises and all-encompassing love, she's found the most wisdomin life's maddeningly consistent inconsistencies, as well as the subtle ways one cancultivate a feeling of home. Dear Divine doesn't take a red pen to life, it brings an openheart, an open mind and achingly beautiful, opulently weird folk songs.
