We here at the antipodean outpost of Backseat Mafia have avidly followed the burgeoning career of Belgian/Australian artist Romanie, and her new single ‘When Will We Lose Hope?’ further develops and advances her immersive musical universe.
Merging a folk style with something more muscular and left-field with unexpected distortion towards the end, it is a track that sees Romanie (Romanie Assez) pondering on world events and the grim state of being, reflecting on her role as an artist amidst global turmoil and examine her emotional growth and interpersonal relationships: offering a message of love, care, community, and gentle hope. Romanie says of the track:
I hadn’t written a song in a very long time, having just completed my ‘Are We There Yet?’ album promo I was feeling kind of lost in the world – …wondering if making music was the right thing to do, looking at villains ruling the world and destroying the planet, children dying and people being denied an existence. I was running on autopilot and – now looking back – avoiding feeling things. During the first School of Song lecture, Adrienne Lenker talked about having to let yourself feel things in order to write music and be curious. I cried and felt so inspired knowing that so many other beautiful songwriters were experiencing the same thing and suddenly writing songs and making music felt like the only straight forward thing to do. It’s a really sad song and also deeply personal, but I really want to emphasize the hope in it too: it’s important to keep loving and caring for community.
As usual it is delivered with her wondrous range and expression and, reflecting her last single ‘Uh Oh’ (reviewed by me here), sees a move towards more experimentation and innovation in delivery. The sudden shift to distortion and background noise is sobering and accentuates the message – an element of entropy and fuzz that clouds our lives.
The accompanying video is directed by Romanie and Guy Perkins is close and personal:
‘When Will We Lose Hope?’ is out today and can be downloaded and streamed via all the usual sites here.
Romanie has some live dates coming up and has also been honing her DJ skills with sets and participation in Your Shot – and is spinning next on 30 Aug as part of Curio Collective Vol 1 @ Bad Decisions!
Live dates:
22 Aug – The Night Cat *supporting End of Fashion
28-30 Nov – Queenscliff Music Festival
Feature Photograph: Marcus Coblyn
