Saint Saviour returns with new song ‘Poetry’.
The songwriter – real name Becky Jones – has incredible breadth, capable of moving from synth pop to Autumnal folk-hewn musicality, all while maintaining a unified musical voice. Taking time out, new single ‘Poetry’ opens a fresh chapter, and it’s her first release in three years.
Out now, it’s a song that aims for simplicity, blending the organic feel of her latter work with Saint Saviour’s innate grasp of melody. The lyrics arose from a playground conversation with a close friend, touching on Biblical verse and abstract philosophy.
It’s held together by Saint Saviour’s ability to connect, and her patient pursuit of musical truth. She comments…
“‘It’s all poetry’ is something a close friend said one day when we were discussing the Bible during one of our marathon playground chats. Having no religion, this came as news to me and the seed of this idea stuck with me for ages. A text to keep chipping away at, re-interpreting, re-applying to your needs, a lifetime of wonder. The song looks at applying this same concept to life: “Little by little you’ll understand, little by little they’ll come to your hand”.”
She continues: “I’ve written this song at a time when life has been thrown into high contrast, and the Biblical metaphors are suddenly more resonant. Nevertheless It’s an existential song about embracing the great mystery of love. There’s a link to Kierkegaard’s idea of ‘becoming’ which I was playing with the chorus’s concluding line. I’m happy because it’s the closest I think I’ve ever got to a lyrically simple song about love without subverting too much. In the studio, we wondered if the song needed another verse, but I wanted to allow the listener to reflect. Bill embraced this and built this incredible explosion of noise around what was originally a sad little whistle solo. I think it communicates so beautifully without words.”
Pieced together alongside Bill Ryder-Jones, ‘Poetry’ is out now. The visuals also hold a personal connection for Becky, utilising footage of the Teesside coast, an area familiar to her from her childhood in the North East.
She says…
The footage comes from a series of films I have always loved, courtesy of local filmmaker (and Seal Sands former employee) Maxy Bianco, whose work focuses on the industrial breakdown of the area and how local characters thrive alternatively, interacting with nature, finding wonder in an unlikely place. In Iris Murdoch’s philosophy she talked about the act of ‘unselfing’, something I have thought much about in recent years and explore in my writing. One of my best examples of an ‘unselfing’ is the time I was on a jet lagged, homesick jog around Sydney Harbour whilst on tour. As I reached the foot of the bridge, I made out some writing, ‘Dorman Long’ stamped into the side, and was suddenly lifted, on the other side of the world, by the love and pride of my home town.
Tune in now.
Photo Credit: Frazer Dunleavy
