Brave Enough - Lindsey Stirling

Photographer: Andrew Zaeh. Lindsey Stirling's third album, Brave Enough, is where her crossover sound falls nicely into place. Her first two efforts -- thrilling collisions of violin acrobatics and electronic embellishment -- were novel, but there was something missing to that new age dubstep. On Brave Enough, Stirling taps into a deep well of pain -- inspired by her own emotional maturity and the death of her best friend and keyboardist, Jason Gaviati, in November 2015 -- and the result is an organic interplay between her instrument and digital beats that focuses more on pleasant rhythms than dubstep muscle. Each song is a step through the processing of pain, an emotional roller coaster that finds Stirling on a journey to face the darkness and find a way to carry on. The ethereal "Lost Girls" cleanses Stirling's confusion with a Celtic raver. From there, a handful of guests assist in conveying Stirling's thoughts. Christina Perri adds her effective sentimentality to the title track,