Chris Hawkes

Chris Hawkes writes songs that feel like conversations with the darker corners of the mind. He came up in London, drawing from the kind of plainspoken, heavy-hearted storytelling you hear in Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen. His 2014 track 'Falling Into Doubt' got some attention for its direct look at uncertainty, wrapped in a spare, melodic arrangement.

He followed that with albums like 'Whispers of Doubt' in 2015 and 'Echoes of Loss' in 2017, sticking to that moody, introspective lane. The writing tends to lean into difficult feelings without much decoration, which has drawn both listeners who find it honest and some criticism for being too bleak. He's kept working with a small group of musicians around him, putting out 'The Shadowed Light' in 2019.