Tiny Vipers

***Jesy Fortino has created folk music under the moniker Tiny Vipers since the 2000s. Those familiar with her music are aware of its artistic weight, with now-classic records like Life On Earth and Laughter establishing Fortino as an artist outside of and beyond her age. Tiny Vipers’ music is known for its crushing emotional gravity as much as it is for its hushed stillness, with an awareness of an indefinable beyond that is only accessible through her work. 2025 will bring a new album to Fortino’s canon, entitled Tormentor.

The years between releases have found Fortino’s life in a state of significant change. Tormentor, with its nine tracks, meditates on her experience: whether speaking directly from her soul in the title track, or observing the horrors of sensory awareness on “Breakfast,” Fortino establishes herself as a participant, observer and mediator of the paradoxes inherent in human experience. Her subtle, often near-silent guitar work hints at a vast and spectral presence. Her melodics and instrumentation place Fortino in conversation with the American folk tradition, while her singular song structures and enigmatic lyrics are effortlessly avant-garde. Album centerpiece “Rainfalls” encapsulates this dynamic perfectly, with its obviously beautiful lyrics and melody sitting within a piece as daring as it is astonishing. The result is nothing short of astounding.

Jesy Fortino has recently acquired the rights to all of her recorded work and will be releasing Tormentor herself, without the assistance from any outside entity. Fortino’s work has been compared to John Fahey, Joni Mitchell and Ry Cooder, and she has shared a stage with the likes of Patti Smith, Damo Suzuki of Can and Grouper. Tormentor will be available in late 2025 and is already poised to be one of the great LPs of the year.