Courageous enough to be vulnerable, Mars Aspen (they/them) gets real with their lush folk confessionals. This Ottawa-based songwriter digs into the hardest parts of intimate connections, spilling their heart so that you—in turn—can better understand your own.

On their new EP baby teeth, Aspen offers raw, direct snapshots into the ups and downs of past relationships with others—as well as their relationship with their own mental health. These songs “stem from past trauma,” Aspen explains. “I’m coming to terms with where I’ve been before, while honouring where I was at that time.” The clear-eyes songs describe when heartbreak feels like swallowing hot glue, when yearning pours out like juice, and when the remnants of relationships are—as Aspen sings it—’mushrooms and roots in the dirt with the beetles and moss’. With shades of Lizzy McAlpine and Imogen Heap, this EP epitomizes Aspen’s songwriting mantra: “The only way it works is to let it all out.”

Aspen honed their production skills with 2022’s shimmering in orbit! EP (recorded entirely in Aspen’s basement). baby teeth features stunning arrangements dreamed up alongside producer Kieran Isley swaying from haunting, softly-strummed ballads to Kate Bollinger-inspired folk-pop. Aspen makes these songs soar with strata of vocal harmonies, as on the divine folk incantation “i want to be so sweet”.

Having always practiced songwriting as a form of therapy, Aspen’s songs on baby teeth are disarming in their candour. “pest control” explores the complexities of queer relationships and the painstaking process of digging into the reasons why some of them simply (or catastrophically) end (as Aspen sings, ‘I attract what I give / I give all that I am / nothing I won’t submit’). Aspen confronts holding onto righteous anger on “i’d like to stay mad”, a dissection of social toxicity. Aspen approaches songwriting by “dumping emotions onto a page, letting them settle, and rearranging them to sound like a song,” and you can hear them work out these interpersonal conflicts like puzzles. There’s a sense of calm in hearing the trauma settle, in hearing the narrator grow.

baby teeth is ultimately a collection of songs about growth. “They’re about realizing that we need to grow up sometimes,” Aspen laughs, “despite how jarring a sentence that is!” Having flirted with frustration, disavowal, and finally, bittersweet resolve, Aspen is leaving plenty of room for all that is to come.