Jessica Pratt: In Dreams

Jessica Pratt is making up for lost time.

In 2012, when the then-San-Francisco-based singer-songwriter released her self-titled debut album, little was known about the haunting and gorgeous voice behind the lo-fi collection of indie folk ballads. In fact, most of the songs on the album weren’t even new — Pratt had written the majority of them five years before the album hit shelves. She didn’t even have any plans to release what was essentially a collection of home-recorded demos until White Fence’s Tim Presley expressed interest in releasing the album on his Birth Records label.

What Pratt didn’t plan for was how well the album would come to be received, selling out its first vinyl pressing in less than two weeks and garnering nearly universal positive reviews from critics. Things were changing, and quickly.

“The initial first wave after the album came out was just kind of like coming to terms with the fact that this happened, and trying to figure that out,” she says in a phone interview from her home. “There wasn’t that much time before it was out. I wasn’t even playing shows, like at all. So by the time I got my head on straight I realized, ‘Oh shit! I should be working on this all the time.’”

In the two-plus years since Pratt’s debut was released, the 27-year-old has undergone a pretty dramatic period of change. In addition to touring regularly and making the transition into being a professional musician, she’s moved from San Francisco to Los Angeles. She also made another big move, signing with renowned independent label Drag City, which is home to a number of kindred spirits like Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy and Joanna Newsom.

The first fruit borne of the new partnership, her second album On Your Own Love Again, finds Pratt sounding even more confident and ambitious than she did on its predecessor. The amount of time that has passed since she wrote her debut album — which she says is “a bit like someone’s high school diary being opened” — has allowed her a lot of time to evolve as a songwriter. The new songs have a more distinctively psychedelic sound about them, like in the unexpected and disorienting pitch change of “Jacquelyn in the Background,” the stunning layers of “I’ve Got a Feeling,” or the ethereal surrealism of “Wrong Hand.”

By and large, these changes come as a result of minor adjustments. Like her debut, Pratt recorded the entire album at home, but there are some subtle touches of organ and keyboards in certain moments that give the songs a richer sonic feel.

“I’ve always heard the music in my head as more of a layered pop thing, and maybe a little psychedelic and dreamy,” she says. “I end up writing these songs and just playing them on one guitar. And there are all these elements taking place around that song that maybe no one else can hear, or … are, at best, implied musically. If people pick up on that, then I’d be happy. I definitely wanted it to feel fuller. I feel like it’s not a crazy jump from the first record, but it’s just enough.”

That nuanced blend of organic and dreamlike qualities carries through into the lyrical themes of the record. Pratt tends to imbue her songs with a poetic kind of language, in which even the most straightforward ideas are filtered through unearthly imagery. On its face, “Back Baby” is a simple break-up song, but it’s sprinkled with lines about a glass world that “encloses you in crystalline.” Elsewhere, on “Moon Dude,” she puts a human, melancholy spin on a narrative of someone floating in space.

“It’s kind of a mix of both literal, emotional content and … like, dream abstractions. I like that combination,” Pratt says of her lyrical approach. “There will be sort of more of a concrete statement within a bed of other things that are maybe slightly more poetic.”

As Pratt continues to evolve as a songwriter, the literal sound of her music is growing with her; though for the time being, her live performances are strictly solo affairs. As her progression as an artist accelerates, however, so does her willingness to adapt and evolve.

“At a certain point, even if you are comfortable [playing solo], there’s only so far you can get with a certain set of songs before your attention span starts to wear thin,” she says. “I’ve only played with one human, specifically, ever in my life in a live setting. But I would like to experiment playing with more people.

“I’m ready for things to change a bit.”

This article appears in our March/April 2015 issue. Subscribe here.