You might have seen the name Castlemusic in the smattering of (fawning, rapturous) local press that Jennifer Castle accrued for last year’s You Can’t Take Anyone (Blue Fog), a searingly dry and evocative set of spare, dread-infused balladry. Then again, you might not have — though she played a fair number of local shows following its release in July, Castle also gave birth to a baby boy in late fall, and the late stages of pregnancy can put a crimp in your promo tour. But buoyed by the acclaim given to the disc, as well as her guest vocals on year-end-poll-topping albums by Fucked Up and the Constantines, Castle plans to step up her performing and touring schedule.

“For a long time,” she explains, “I never wanted to put pressure on songwriting. And now I just think that I’ve done it for enough years, in terms of writing and performing, that [I know] this is what I do. I have less time these days to put towards it, so I want the time that I do have to be for that.”

Castle’s voice is more often a whisper than a shout. It’s a powerful, steady presence that seems always to be holding itself apart from the brittle guitar and foreboding piano that provide the instability that Castle’s lyrics imply, whether she’s warning about how “nobody will love you with cheekbones cut like that” (“Piece of Glass”) or “I Loved Him Now He’s Gone,” a funereal tune that draws on British folk singers like Anne Briggs, Castle says, as well as that endless fount of inspiration, the blues.

“Whenever I listen to the blues, I think, ‘these guys are just pounding over the same thing, working over the same thing over and over, and it’s so beautiful.”