Center Of Affection

The indie-rock project of New York-based songwriter and artist Maria Crawford, Wilby’s debut full-length, Center of Affection features 12 songs of unflinching vulnerability and cut-throat honesty, intimate revelations after years of emotional reflection and self-acceptance. Center of Affection began as a creative practice, a result of morning pages that unfurled like stream of consciousness diary entries. During previous efforts, when Crawford would write to prompts, enter the nebulous “album mode,” or search for a theme to spur her creative practice, everything felt forced. It was only in letting go, in a decision to let her strongest ideals bubble from the roots of her subconscious to the top of her mind, that she was able to write her bravest, most beautiful, and strongest effort to date. Despite the creative wellspring from which these songs emerged, there’s a precision and clarity to Wilby’s songwriting that is fully-formed on Center of Affection. She’s been one of Nashville’s most exciting indie artists since graduating from the city’s Belmont College (although she just relocated to New York), but on her debut LP, that promise is fulfilled; there’s an intoxicating splendor to this album, rich and filling both lyrically and sonically. On projects like 2021’s EP Translucent Beauty and 2023’s EP happiest woman, desires and wants are amplified, projected onto center stage, and ruminate over. On Center of Affection, these urges are still circling, but Crawford is more interested in why they emerged than satisfying them.  Through her acute songwriting and arresting indie-rock soundscapes, Wilby has picked up support from FLOOD Magazine, KEXP, WNXP, Northern Transmissions, Nashville’s Lightning 100 as DJ Pick of the Week and Atwood Magazine’s Artist to Watch among others.