The List of The Anchoress Albums in Order of Release Date

Few artists working the seam between prog, art-pop, and confessional songwriting have built a case for themselves quite like Catherine Anne Davies. Since forming her project in 2013 in the UK, the Welsh-born multi-instrumentalist, producer, and PhD-holding author has spent a decade turning grief, romance, and razor-sharp storytelling into some of British guitar music’s most acclaimed records. If you’re trying to map out The Anchoress Albums in Order, you’re looking at a discography that’s small in number but enormous in impact — three albums that each mark a distinct chapter in her evolution as a songwriter and self-producer.

Davies has picked up two Welsh Music Prize nominations, an HMV Welsh Album of the Year award, and glowing reviews from The Guardian, The Sunday Times, and Prog Magazine, while collaborating with the likes of Manic Street Preachers, Bernard Butler, and Simple Minds along the way. Elton John has named one of her records among his own favorites of the year. Fans mapping out The Anchoress Albums in Order often come to her from those same orbits — Kate Bush, Marianne Faithfull, and the Manics are frequent reference points critics reach for when describing her sound. Here’s the complete list of The Anchoress albums in order of release.

All The Anchoress Albums Available on: Apple Music

How Many Albums Does The Anchoress Have?

The Anchoress has released Three (3) studio albums as of 2026, alongside an acclaimed collaborative record with Bernard Butler, a handful of EPs and expanded/acoustic reissues, and a run of singles going back to 2014.

The List of The Anchoress Albums in Order of Release Date

Here is The List of The Anchoress Albums in Order of Release Date:

1. Confessions of a Romance Novelist — January 15, 2016
2. The Art of Losing — March 12, 2021
3. As We Once Were — August 7, 2026

All The Anchoress Albums List in Order

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1. Confessions of a Romance Novelist (2016)

Tracks:

1. Long Year
2. What Goes Around
3. Doesn’t Kill You
4. You and Only You (feat. Paul Draper)
5. One for Sorrow
6. P.S. Fuck You
7. Popular
8. Bury Me
9. Intermission (Notes to the Editor)
10. Waiting to Breathe
11. Chip on Your Shoulder
12. Confessions of a Romance Novelist
13. Rivers of Ice

Davies introduced herself as The Anchoress with this debut, released on Kscope and co-produced alongside former Mansun frontman Paul Draper. Structured as part concept album narrated by a fictional pulp-romance author, part collection of character sketches, and part raw personal confession, it announced her as a songwriter unafraid to mix wit with genuine anguish. Critics leaned hard on Kate Bush comparisons, with Prog magazine calling it “Kate Bush’s Hounds of Love updated for the 21st century”, and the record went on to be named among The Guardian’s albums of the year. It also earned Davies the HMV Welsh Album of the Year title, Best Newcomer honors at the PROG Awards, and her first Welsh Music Prize nomination. Standout cuts include the brooding title track and the confrontational “P.S. Fuck You,” which showcase the theatrical, multi-instrumental style she’d keep refining on later records.

2. The Art of Losing (2021)

Tracks:

1. Moon Rise (Prelude)
2. Let It Hurt
3. The Exchange (feat. James Dean Bradfield)
4. Show Your Face
5. The Art of Losing
6. All Farewells Should Be Sudden
7. All Shall Be Well
8. Unravel
9. Paris
10. 5AM
11. The Heart Is a Lonesome Hunter
12. My Confessor
13. With the Boys
14. Moon (An End)

Five years after her debut, Davies returned self-written and self-produced, delivering a darker, more experimental alt-pop record built around grief and its aftermath. The album’s title nods to Elizabeth Bishop’s poem “One Art,” fitting for a literature PhD processing loss through a sequence of character-driven songs rather than straightforward memoir. James Dean Bradfield of Manic Street Preachers guests on the driving “The Exchange,” one of two duets the pair recorded together, while drummer Sterling Campbell (David Bowie, Duran Duran) adds weight to the record’s rhythmic backbone. Reviewers drew lines to Scott Walker’s “Nite Flights” and Bowie’s Berlin period, and the album charted in the UK Top 40, going on to win Prog’s Album of the Year, land on The Sunday Times’ year-end list, and pick up a second Welsh Music Prize nomination. An expanded edition followed in March 2022 with remixes and acoustic reworkings.

3. As We Once Were (2026)

Tracks:

1. Du Temps Perdu (Introduction)
2. Throw Over Your Man (feat. James Dean Bradfield)
3. Damsels (feat. Eaves Wilder)
4. I Had a Baby Not a Lobotomy (feat. Gwenno)
5. As We Once Were
6. Happiness Don’t Show Up Like It Should (Prologue)
7. All I Really Want Is Peace
8. Stop the World
9. Du Temps Perdu (Reprise)
10. What You Did
11. All Fall Down (feat. Hannah Peel)
12. Hand to the Tide
13. She Knows Her Place
14. Happiness Don’t Show Up Like It Should (Epilogue)

Landing via Last Night From Glasgow, this 14-track third album marks a new label era after two records on Kscope, and arrives after Davies spent the years following “The Art of Losing” stockpiling ideas around the birth of her daughter. Self-produced once again at her Black Lodge studio, the record was mixed by Dave Eringa (Manic Street Preachers, Idlewild) and mastered by Jon Astley (The Who, Tori Amos), and folds in a guest list that includes Gwenno, James Dean Bradfield, Eaves Wilder, and Hannah Peel.

Early reaction has been strong even ahead of release, with Elton John calling it one of his favorite records of the year and journalist Caitlin Moran praising its emotional honesty. Tracks like the Bradfield co-write “Throw Over Your Man” and the Gwenno collaboration “I Had a Baby Not a Lobotomy” point to a record that widens Davies’s collaborative circle while staying rooted in the sharp, personal songwriting that’s defined The Anchoress from the start.

The Anchoress FAQs

Is The Anchoress a solo artist or a band? The Anchoress is the solo recording and performing project of Welsh multi-instrumentalist and producer Catherine Anne Davies, who writes, produces, and plays most instruments on her records herself.

What genre is The Anchoress? Her sound spans art-pop, alt-pop, indie rock, and prog, with critics regularly citing Kate Bush, David Bowie, and Scott Walker as reference points.

Did The Anchoress release an album with Bernard Butler? Yes — “In Memory of My Feelings,” a 2020 collaborative album with former Suede guitarist Bernard Butler, though it’s billed as a joint project rather than a solo Anchoress studio album.

What is The Anchoress’s connection to Manic Street Preachers? Davies has repeatedly collaborated with the Manics, duetting live with the band, appearing on their song “Dylan & Caitlin,” and working with James Dean Bradfield across multiple Anchoress records, including “The Art of Losing” and “As We Once Were.”

When did The Anchoress’s most recent album come out? Her third studio album, “As We Once Were,” was released on August 7, 2026 via Last Night From Glasgow.

Conclusion

Across three albums, The Anchoress has moved from the theatrical character studies of “Confessions of a Romance Novelist” to the grief-stricken art-rock of “The Art of Losing” and now into the collaborative, hard-won perspective of “As We Once Were.” Each record has deepened her reputation as one of the UK’s most distinctive self-produced songwriters, racking up Welsh Music Prize nominations and Album of the Year honors along the way. Taken together, The Anchoress Albums in Order trace a genuinely rare arc: an artist getting more ambitious, not less, with every release. With “As We Once Were” freshly out and a new touring cycle expected to follow, this is very much a discography still being written.