Today Half Waif (aka Nandi Rose Plunkett) surprise-released an EP, Portraits, comprised of four reworked songs from her albums Mythopoetics and The Caretaker. The EP finds Nandi singing and playing piano solo, making for a totally stripped-down and highly soulful performance. Of the EP's style, she says:
Over the years, I learned to build layered arrangements around the songs, which at times felt like a kind of armor. Returning to these voice and piano arrangements feels particularly vulnerable for me. There's nothing to hide behind. But it also feels like a homecoming, a nod to where I came from. In this form, I saw the songs from a new angle -- it was like we were meeting again after we've both done some growing up. Sometimes we can say more with so much less.