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Premiere: Emika ‘Close’

Emika returns with ‘Falling In Love With Sadness’, a new LP which boasts her most powerful, personal work to date. Lead single ‘Close’ is a deep, melodic re-introduction to the artist...

Earlier this week, Emika announced her forthcoming album ‘Falling In Love With Sadness’, set for release on World Mental Health Day (10th October).

The album, which follows ‘Melanfonie’, her 2017 orchestral collaboration with the 50-piece Prague Philharmonic Orchestra, finds the artist returning to the electronic, dancefloor leaning dark pop of her self-titled Ninja Tune debut from 2011. The album is a deeply personal one and is said to have been in the works for several years while she was releasing other material.

“I feel there was some kind of sadness that was passed down to me through generations in my family, particularly the women” she says in the album’s press release,”I didn't necessarily feel it was my sadness but it's something I've learned to live with.”

‘Falling In Love With Sadness’ then is an album that relishes in the catharsis of unleashing a melancholy that can overwhelm if allowed to fester inside. “I often wonder how sadness moves through people,” she wrote. “through time, through stories and history, and if it's something that becomes us rather than coming from us.”

Part of the album’s proceeds will be donated to a UK-based mental health charity.

It finds Emika teaming up with Robert Witschakowski of The Exaltics on co-production duty and is described as being somewhat of an “overture” for her work to come in future.

‘Close’ – premiering below – is a powerful assertion of intent for this album, a euphoric electronic venture that wields its deeply personal and emotional heft while keeping its energy firmly focussed on the dancefloor. Arpggiated synths and a thudding bass embellish Emika’s hypnotic, transfixing vocals in the introduction to a 10-track outing that may be her strongest to date.

Check out the video for ‘Close’ below too.

 

Photo credit: Bet Orten