As ambient folk artist Black Brunswicker, Etta Helfrich creates rich ground for reflection with roaming instrumentals closely rooted in nature, casting a restful spell. The Bloomington, Indiana-born artist grew up in the Midwest and brings the sweeping plains of the landscape into their expansive guitar-led sound, drawing you closer to something primordial, vast, and earthy.Accordingly bound up with a sense of adventure and wanderlust, much of Helfrich’s output has been shaped by the experience of travel (Helfrich is now based in Manchester, UK), from the small trips taken around her new UK home on Wanderers in the North (2020) and the pastel-hued snapshot of the Czech Republic on Age of Aristocracy (2019) to the daydreaming that propelled the 2020 lockdown release Wilder Paths. Her 2024 full-length Been Around Here Before used DIY tape loops, field recordings, and washes of ambient guitar to map out the Midwest through a collection of mellowed-out, sun-glazed postcards. Recorded with local musicians from the Indiana-born artist’s new home in Manchester, England—including vocalist Emily Mercer—the LP revisits US road trips and natural beauty spots to build a summer scrapbook of her past, helping her to process present-day anxieties and find a quiet stillness through music.