On single release day, these two words have to go
Day 8 of my daily index card collage challenge. "Gobblin' Time" - get it? Original monster by Zozoville.
Next Wednesday 15th January I’m releasing my first new song in two years.1
“Emotional Tourist” is the first single I’m sharing publicly2 from my seventh solo album “House Of Stories”.
I’m probably supposed to be “excited to announce…” or “delighted to introduce…” but, 15 years after the first time I was excited to announce a single3, I’m hoping to stretch my vocabulary.
It’s not that I’m not excited, or indeed delighted. I’m both, and more. I’ve been doing this long enough to know that the words I write on the matter are essential to encouraging, persuading and intriguing you towards tapping “play” and giving my song a chance.
I also know that writing “I’m excited to announce that my new song is out now” is a waste of everyone’s time.
I’m…Who is this person?
Excited…I’ve read that word a thousand times already today – next!
Announce…Where are we, a train station?
My…Sorry, why are you in my feed again? I don’t know you.
New song…Every song I haven’t heard yet is new, what difference does the release date make to me?
Out now…Ohhh, is this an advert? Ugh, I hate being advertised to, no thanks.
A large chunk of my time as a full-time solo artist and self-facilitating media node4 is spent creating excitement around things I made a while ago.
I embrace this.
Andy J. Pizza, of the wonderful, changed-my-life podcast Creative Pep Talk, recently shared a series of episodes around the second Hero’s Journey. He called it the “Journey Of The True Fan”5, and it’s very helpful.
If the first Hero’s Journey sees the hero – yes, you – bravely leaving your metaphorical home to adventure out into the world, battling through adversity to find the elixir, the second is where you bring the elixir home to share with your people, the ones who need it just as much as you do.
What’s the elixir? It’s what you make – what you want to make. What you’re called to make. What you haven’t made yet…but you’re going to make. When you make that thing, wouldn’t you like to share it with people? And wouldn’t that feel more comfortable and less intimidating/gross/cringey if you believed that what you made would help them in some way?
It’s true, you know. Art heals. Songs create spaces for people to feel their feelings. Music is a collaboration between the people making the sounds, and the people listening.
If my song comes out next Wednesday and no-one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?
Not really.
My song isn’t worthless if no-one listens to it. It can be enough that I pulled it out from deep within my psyche and put the time, energy and focus in to make it into something that could be played to another human. That’s fine.
But it’s ok to want people to listen / watch / read too. And I do. And I’ve been doing this for a long time. And it’s (currently) my full-time job (thanks to generous music fans who choose to pay for something they could listen to for free).
I crave connection with other humans. Many of us do.
So, there would be very little point to me going to all the fuss of writing and recording my songs, having them professionally mixed and mastered and commissioning an artist to illustrate the album cover if I wasn’t prepared to spend time and energy on communicating my excitement and delight at my single being OUT NOW.
If you make art that you want people to experience, respond to and potentially heal from, this second Hero’s Journey is essential, and in my experience it’s not best spent:
- Complaining on the internet about how we’re being forced to become “content creators”. Snore. No-one is forcing you to do anything. No-one is expecting you to make music / paint / write / make videos / anything. They don’t know you exist.
Why not spend that energy sharing your work in an interesting way? Every single time I see this post from an artist I wish they’d just shared a little story about their art instead. - Publicly railing against the powers that be while doing nothing in real life to create lasting change and/or finding interesting ways to share your art despite the raw deal we genuinely do get.
- Announcing that you’re “excited” and “delighted” that your new song/book/video is OUT NOW!!!
Damn. So…what should I do instead? My single is out in less than a week! Fuuuuuuuuuuck!!!!!
Ok. Calm down. It’s just songs.6
While I’m truly aiming to avoid the words “excited” and “delighted” this time round, it is important to be keyed up, galvanised or otherwise invigorated about our work. If we don’t feel it, the people we’re hoping to invite to appreciate it certainly won’t.
I know “House Of Stories” is my best album yet7, but instead of excitement / delightment I’m going for a quiet confidence, an open-hearted generosity of spirit and a desire to use my words to go deeper into what my 11 new songs are about, how I felt when I wrote them and how I feel about them now.
The time for musing and pondering is upon me. More soon.
Here’s what I do know: I make sad songs to make you feel better. I share music humbly to create honest, positive and potentially healing experiences for you. And I’m incredibly grateful for the opportunities that exist to share our work through myriad digital spaces, reaching out across the ether to make connections with other humans (that’s you – hi!)
I just think we can find deeper and more resonant ways to share our stories – preferably without quite so much shouting.
Another thing I’ve picked up from my 20 years of writing on the internet is to leave the reader with one simple Call To Action.
Unfortunately, in this essay I decided to do a Stewart Lee8 / Katie Lee9 and include many humorous footnotes, thereby fucking up any real chance I may have earned of you taking the required next action to listen to my new song.
Dagnabbit.
Thankfully, because I am indeed a self-facilitating media node, I’ve arranged for you to be able to pre-order my new album today on limited edition vinyl colours, signed CD and hybrid analogue/digital format KiT.
You’ll receive next week’s single “Emotional Tourist” + the title track “House Of Stories” in your inbox immediately, with a new song every month up to the release date in April 2025.
Hooray!
Thanks for reading. I’m excited and delighted you’re here.
Love,
Laura xxx
- Aside from “Our Last Christmas”, which came out in early December. That one had a short shelf life, for obvious reasons…but I’m really glad I made this video for it in a Berlin Christmas market. It wasn’t at all weird wandering around filming myself and whispering the lyrics at double speed. I just have a weird job – and I love it!
↩︎ - Members of my Correspondent’s Club received it on New Year’s Eve, and people who have already pre-ordered my album received it shortly afterwards. Only the best for the best.
↩︎ - My first single “Let This Be” was released under the name She Makes War in April 2010. This self-directed music videostars Regé-Jean Page of Bridgerton and now Hollywood fame. Yes, 15 years ago my then-boyfriend’s little brother was keen for any experience on set, and he was always lovely to hang out with. Thanks, Regé! I’m SO proud of you.
↩︎ - If you know, you know.
↩︎ - Behold Andy’s “Journey Of The True Fan” series – parts 1, 2, 3 and 4. He’s here on Substack being awesome, too.
↩︎ - Rebecca Lucy Taylor aka pop goddess Self Esteem said “it’s just songs” in this episode of my podcast “Attention Engineer” in February 2021 – just before she casually became (aka worked her arse off to become) a bona fide pop star. Well done, RLT! I’d love to do an “after they were famous” followup episode…
↩︎ - And I still really like the other seven, so that’s saying something…
↩︎ - This book changed my life. No exaggeration. If you perform in any way – read it asap.
↩︎ - Her Substack newsletter is BRILLIANT and she just published a crime novel – go Katie!
↩︎
Creativity Letterbox Music News Process