A Mythological Journey with Falling You's Metanoia, Echoes March CD of the Month
By John Diliberto 3/1/2026
One problem with a lot of dream pop albums is they tend to sound pretty much the same all the way through. The same singer, same time signatures, same instrumentation. That’s not the case with Metanoia by Falling You. It is a seductively immersive album straight through, taking you on a different sonic voyage on each song, from the snarling blues twang of “Throw the Stone,” to the Celtic brogue of “Constellations,” to the epic journey of “They Give Me Flowers.”
Falling You is the dream pop project of John Michael Zorko. It began in 1998 with singer Jennifer McPeak, but since then, he’s been crafting deep, moody dream pop tracks with a bevy of different singers. They have included vocalists Suzanne Perry from Love Spirals Downwards, Anji (Bee) Lum from Lovespirals, Dru Allen of This Ascension and Mirabilis, Amanda Kramer of Golden Palominos, and electronic pop artist Kirsty Hawkshaw.
It has been six years since Falling You’s last album, Shine. For Metanoia , which means a change of consciousness or mindset, he’s adapted Greek mythology to tell tales of transformation.
The aforementioned “Throw the Stone” features singer Colleen Hilker singing a tale of lost love in a bluesy drawl that seems to address the metanoia theme, but it’s a bit of a false lead, as the next track signals the thesis of the album, based in Greek mythology.
That happens on “Demiurge” which is a name for a being who has created the universe. Of the vocal tracks, it is the most abstract, horror movie feel on the album, as Jennifer Wilde intones a litany of Greek mythological figures, mostly women, and most of whom were either seduced, raped, abducted or all of the above. In a swirl of synthesizers, vocal lamentations and tension creating noise, she chants in Latin the only prose lyric “This is your body, their moment.”
From there it’s off to tales of capricious and/or predatory gods and their victims. It begins with “Flesh to Tree,” based on the story of the god Apollo chasing the nymph Daphne, whose father turns her into a tree to thwart Apollo’s advances. Singer Courtney Grace tells this tale of obsessive love due to Cupid’s arrow, beginning over fluttering synth-flutes, before a deep bassline and melodic feedback guitar launch into this story of unrequited infatuation.
Courtney Grace turns up again on “Ariadne,” inspired by the tale of Theseus and the Minotaur and maze. Grace turns the tale into a heartbreaking love song, recounting the events that eventually turned Ariadne into a constellation. That’s a fate that seems to befall many of these women. Zorko creates a beautiful architecture around Grace, first as a dreamy, but propulsive pop tune with a bridge of Grace’s voice swirling in free fall. before finding redemption in the final half, as the music turns even more energized before the final chant, which Zorko couches in all kinds of noises like a sailing ship, crewless and lost at sea.
“Alcyone” taps Zorko’s love of the Cocteau Twins, with an insistent drum grove and flanged guitar strums. But he reaches for a different dynamic, going free as Dru Allen’s vocals are cast in deep delay and reverb for the chorus, and scattered like raging waves in the song’s climax. She wraps her imperious voice around the story of Alcyone and Ceyx, who angered Zeus, who then killed Ceyx. Alcyone commits suicide, but the gods turn her and Ceyx into birds to live on in love. The way Zorko and his singers turn these mythological tales into thoroughly contemporary songs is a wonder.
“They Give Me Flowers” casts the tale of Orpheus and Eurydice as a torch song, going with the idea of Eurydice not wanting to leave the underworld in the first place because she’s happy and free there. Erica Mulkey’s voice is assured and defiant as she sings, “Mama you’re lucky death’s too permanent for me.” Her layered cellos are the kind of sound that gives this album some of its variation while still feeling like a conceptual whole.
Celtic inspiration is never something I’ve ascribed to Falling You, but it comes into play on “Constellations,” sung by Amelia Hogan. Born and raised in California, she specializes in Celtic music and she’s got a touch of Irish brogue in her enunciation. It’s a beautiful fit with Zorko’s fantasy-laced arrangement of rollicking drums, shimmering synth textures and slashing electric guitar chords. Hogan’s lyrics reference all the constellations, moons and planets after mythological figures without actually naming them. It’s an entrancing track.
The album ends with the third epic track, “Philomena,” named for the Christian martyr. It’s a tale which illustrates that Catholics could match Greek and Roman mythological legends in fantastical tales. Vocalist Anji Lum turns it into a fable of strength over adversity with Ryan Lum dropping-in ambient guitar textures and reverberant, blues-laced accents. It’s a track that ends the album as strong as it began.
There are also three instrumental tracks on the Metanoia , ranging from the pastoral journey of “Ari’s Song” with harmonica from Slim Heilpern, to the spacey, wordless vocal trippiness of “(trying to weave) A Thread of Happiness (from one day. . . )” to the immersive, almost suffocating space of “Inside the Whale. The later lives up to its title with dark, surging synthesizer drones and random, threatening noises.
In psychology, metanoia refers to a psychological transformation, often precipitated by crisis, breakdown, or existential conflict. You can hear that in these tales, mostly of women, who have transformed in the face of conflict. It’s also a religious reference to conversion. Falling You takes you on journeys where crisis turns to ecstasy, especially in the music itself, on a deliriously beautiful album.
Hear our 2017 Interview with Falling You.
Join the Echoes CD of the Month Club.