So begins the beautiful bittersweet Black Hole Heaven. For her forth album Hannah Marcus takes us on a Kafka-esque cook's tour of the new western front, from the psychotropical artist haunts of San Francisco and Los Angeles to the fluorescent sunsets of Los Alamos. It is an epic tale of love and chemicals.

"I wanted to make a big 70’s rock concept album when I started" explains Hannah. "But then things went awry. I got divorced, and began staying up way too late at night." The net effect is a woman bouncing between the gods and the cockroaches, waxing turmoil with the wonder of it all. Some artists make albums that are a collection of snappy numbers to tap your toe to-- Hannah Marcus writes songs that will inhabit you.

Born and bred in New York City, Hannah spent her childhood roaming the streets of Manhattan's Upper West Side, between Spanish Harlem and the Columbia University Campus. Her father was a cellist and often held chamber music rehearsals and recitals in their apartment. Her mother was a painter who would work late into the night in her studio listening to Leonard Cohen, Phil Ochs, the Supremes, Bob Dylan and Judy Collins.

An older sister Melissa, was born with severe autism and it affected Hannah deeply. "She allowed me to empathize with states of mind and sensory perspectives that defy generalization - that challenge one's sense of who one is, of what intelligence and morality are, of what love is."

Marcus wrote her first song in a dream she had at the age of five, in which a bust of Beethoven sat up in his coffin and sang " a kiss on the lips and I die if I will." In her teen years she discovered Lou Reed and her songwriting took on the fevered angst of a New York City school girl but in college she abandoned music and only exploited her songwriting skills to whip up a quick Senior Thesis.

She spent some time in Bar-None’s home port of Hoboken but stayed on the fringes of the music scene singing Velvet Underground covers in old man bars to disinterested cops.

A move to San Francisco lead her back to writing. One night she caught Mark Eitzel with American Music Club in a Soma parking lot and knew she wanted to perform her own material (Tim Mooney from AMC would go on to co-produce "Black Hole Heaven"). Mark Kozelek of Red House Painters was an early supporter and produced her albums Demerol (199?) and River of Darkness (1996).

After getting married and moving to Los Angeles, Hannah began searching for a new musical approach. She contacted her friend Joe "Karl J." Goldring, a notorious and brilliant bay area engineer and musician (Swans, Hope Sandoval, Mark Eitzel, , Tarnation). Joe had just opened up Pig's Head studio in San Francisco, and there they collaborated with Tim Mooney (Sleepers, AMC, Toiling Midgets), Ralph Carney (Tom Waits, Waitresses) among others to create the record Faith Burns, an intoxicating brew of psychedelic torch songs and industrial folk that was called "a seductive stunner... an eternal flame of sultry, swooning artistry" by Alternative Press.

Faith Burns was barely finished when Hannah began work on a follow-up-- but there was friction at Pig's Head. Trying to commute between San Francisco and LA her marriage crumbled and the recording sessions grew chaotic. One night Joe Goldring ran out of the studio upon hearing an early version of the song "Osiris in Pieces" screaming "this is everything that is wrong with music today!" Recording came to a halt and Hannah was left to pick up the pieces.

Alone in her apartment she began recording songs on an ADAT - the basic tracks for "Los Alamos", "Crimson Bird", and the revivified "Osiris In Pieces", the humble yet hopeful "Tired Swan" and the wonderfully resigned "Darling How Are You". She gave them to Tim Mooney who was very excited about continuing with the project and encouraged her to go back in the studio. Tim co-produced the record, bringing in such musicians as guitar effects master Michael Belfer (Tuxedomoon, Black Lab), DJ Ill Media (from Most Chill Slackmob) and Joe Goldring returned to play and work on the mixes, (especially "Osiris In Pieces"). The album emerged like a lotus from the muck.

Hannah Marcus is a reporter back from the edge and Black Hole Heaven is her intra-galactic war chronicle of the heart - dark to be sure - but infused with lucid wonder and humor that transcends mere irony. Imagine that.

Please visit the official Hannah Marcus Website for discography, reviews, and audio samples.

Their is a great review of Hannah Marcus new records "Black Hole Heaven" found in Athens, G.A.'s Baby Sue/LMNOP. Hannah Marcus is also the featured artist at http://www.gurl.com/ which includes an interview and a free Mp3 download of "Lot 309"