(Self-released, CD, digital) The ghosts of bands past linger in the Green Mountains, like those haunting ruined cities in a J.R.R. Tolkien novel — vestigial mysteries that all but scream, Learn our secret history! Listen to our obscure album! Music journalists diving down these irresistibl e rabbit holes can sometimes unearth hidden treasures, thrilling when a trail from the past leads to something new — such as Burlington bluegrass and folk act Marsh Lights. Just a few minutes into their "debut" LP — more on that later — Cover the Water, there's something strangely familiar in lead vocalist Colby Crehan's pristine vocals. A little internet digging quickly reveals the truth: Marsh Lights once went by PossumHaw, a Burlington band that disbanded in 2017 when Crehan moved to Wyoming. Her husband and bandmate, banjoist Ryan Crehan, had taken a job at Grand Teton National Park. The couple returned to Vermont in 2023 and promptly got the band back together, including guitarist Charley Eiseman, mandolin player Stephen Waud and bassist Mitch Barron. Reborn as Marsh Lights, the quintet claimed a new name and new lease on life but picked up sonically right where it left off. Colby Crehan is central to everything on Cover the Water. Her vocals and lyrics add earthy layers of depth and dynamism to the compositions, which are some of the most poignant of the former Bluegrass Gospel Project singer's career. "Hide Your Shield" is a meditative and gorgeous folk ballad — a paean to emotional honesty told from the perspective of a lover to a returning soldier. "In the tall grass of the field / leave your armor, hide your shield / in the deep snow the earth is under / hide your shield, leave your armor," Colby sings. A gothic heart beats at the core of the record. "Piece of Silver" and the title track both harbor a strange sense of anxiety lying in wait beneath the babbling banjo and chiming mandolin. That's particularly true of the latter song and its lyrics about encircling ice and frozen boats. The darkness grows on "Running Through the Halls," given form in the killer harmonies of Barron, Eiseman and Ryan Crehan — a Marsh Lights specialty that runs through Cover the Water. Waud contributes some of his finest mandolin work on the song, peeling off notes with a tone as clear as an open blue sky, a perfect foil… ...read more read less