Her first solo record label was the ultra-hip Sub Pop, and she’s just worked with best mate Sufjan Stevens on her new album; endorsement enough for us! Rosie Thomas’s trademark is a folksy, breathy, fragile vocal sprinkled over sparse musical arrangements; simple yet captivating. She started her musical career in Seattle, the town that brought us Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain, playing with a band called Velour 100 in the late 90s before going down the solo route, during which she’s brought out four albums. Her latest release, These Friends Of Mine, consists of recordings made over a two-year period with no particular timetable and no initial thought of releasing them. “Whether you are a musician, painter, or whatever, there is a passion that sometimes gets lost because all of the sudden you have to clock in or have deadlines,” Rosie says. “I sort of wanted to get back to that time when I played music for nothing.” This laid-back approach to her craft has produced an organic thing of beauty including, among many delights, a take on REM’s The One I Love which wouldn’t be out of place on the soundtrack of The Wicker Man. The album, as the title suggests, is a collaborative affair featuring Sufjan and Denison Witmer – with the latter of whom Rosie has already visited Greenbelt. Rosie knew from an early age that she was destined to be an entertainer, and music is not her only performing outlet. She has clearly taken the message of her 2003 album –  Only With Laughter Can You Win – to heart, since she also performs as a stand-up comedian under the alter ego of Sheila Saputo. She was also behind an April Fool’s joke which had many believing she was carrying Sufjan’s  baby. We don’t know if she’ll be cracking one-liners at Greenbelt, but we do know that Entertainment Weekly calls her “a moonlighting comic with an earth-angel voice”. Heavenly.