Singer Russian Red coming to Hong Kong

In the music video for her new single, Casper, Lourdes Hernández — best known by her stage name, Russian Red — drifts between two tacky Americana motel rooms. One has glossy satin sheets, the other, a rotary phone and plastic-wrapped lampshades. The first is her dream room; the second, reality.

Hernández lies on the bed, supine and vulnerable, waiting for a lover who will never come. Her cigarette smoke is blue and her lipstick is red. The scene looks like something out of a David Lynch movie — which was precisely the point.

Russian Red, who is arguably Spain's foremost indie songstress, has often been compared to Canadian singer-songwriter Feist, whose soulful guitar tunes won her international acclaim but unlike Feist, Russian Red's music conveys a lush, desperate longing, expressed through retro guitar music that's pure rock'n'roll. Her newest album, released this month, is titled Agent Cooper, a reference to David Lynch's clean-cut hero from Twin Peaks. Russian Red, so-called for her lipstick colour, is a huge fan of Lynch because of his strong sense of irony and drama. In her music, she says she aims for her own ironic balance. "In general, there is an attempt in every song to grasp the comfort in the combination of a nice melody and a bitter thought," she says.

Agent Cooper marks a turning point in Russian Red's career, both musically and professionally. For the album, she signed with a major label, changed her band format, and began "digging into electronic sounds".

The album has a more intensely charged, sophisticated sound than her earlier work. She reflects that during the process of writing the new album, "I only followed what felt natural for a change, I felt more free and mature and I used my music to express that new stage".

In the past few years, Russian Red has been busy establishing herself as a musical fixture in Spain and beyond. In 2011, her second album, Fuerteventura, debuted at No 2 on the Spanish charts. Tony Doogan, who has previously worked with the likes of Belle & Sebastian, Mogwai and Talking Heads' David Byrne, produced the album. That year, Hernández took home the MTV EMA award for best Spanish artist.