“I FEEL LIKE YOUR LOVER, YOUR SISTER, YOUR MOTHER”
Blossom Caldarone on the her new single ‘Girlfriends’ and why there’s often too much pressure on women to be everything for their partners.
‘Girlfriends’, is the latest track from South London based musician, Blossom Caldarone. It’s the first we’ve heard from her since February’s ‘Less of a Girl’; a touching pop-ballad in which Caldarone sings of the complexities of growing up and ‘becoming’, whilst still needing her mother. At just 21, Caldarone’s whimsical vocal, reminiscent of Lily Allen and Kate Nash, alongside her knack for story-telling, has seen her making waves in the music world, since releasing her first 4-track EP ‘Sit and Be’ in 2017.
Her latest single, ‘Girlfriends’, tells the tale of a relationship let down by a boyfriend’s inability to speak openly about his feelings. “It was basically after a bit of a shit evening with an ex-boyfriend” she tells me. “I was just really upset because the whole situation could’ve been so easily avoided and so easily remedied, if he had just spoken about how he was feeling.” It’s an experience Caldarone says she believes to be common. “I just feel like it happens a lot. Just from talking to other friends about their boyfriends, or talking to older women about their husbands and, you know… my brothers. Everyone’s got brothers who often don’t talk. I think it’s something that’s so universal.”
“There’s such an expectation of women to be like the carers, or the fixers, or the resolvers all the time, and I don't think that it’s necessarily healthy to always be expected to do that.”
Universal the experience most definitely is. As is the experience of feeling that you have to be everything and everyone to a romantic partner, which Caldarone touches on in the chorus, as she sings ‘I feel like your lover, your sister, your mother.’ “It’s such a thing that you’re so indoctrinated to do… as a woman you feel like you have to care for [men]” she says. “There’s such an expectation of women to be like the carers, or the fixers, or the resolvers all the time, and I don't think that it’s necessarily healthy to always be expected to do that, because you can't always do that.”
Despite ‘Girlfriends’ weighty subject matter, Caldarone takes what could have been a despairing story of heartbreak and pairs it with a wholly uplifting pop-melody. The song opens with a raw, folk-like introduction before plunging abruptly into a mellow, piano filled verse, after which it jumps straight back up again into it’s fully charged ear-worm of a chorus. “I just thought it was really fun, to be honest” she says. “I just really didn’t want it to be too sad because, when I wrote it, I was already feeling sad…. we wrote it two hours before a gig and I was like; If I go into this gig feeling really shit it’s just going to be an absolute shit-show, so I need to actually try and chirp myself up. So that’s why the base-line is kind of fun and the chorus is ridiculous” she laughs.
Although ‘Girlfriends’ is a deeply personal song, as much of Caldarone’s music is, the singer admits that she’s struggled to write this year, with the lockdown resulting in a lack of inspiration and additional time for self-reflection. “So much of my inspiration comes from being out and about and meeting people and seeing people and seeing strangers and being like; I wonder what’s going on there? And then writing a song about it. So many of my songs come from that stuff and that’s just not happened.” she tells me. “I wasn't really in the place to be writing really introspectively and kind of focusing on myself. I wasn’t really keen to do that this year because there was already so much thinking time, the last thing I wanted to do was then write a bloody song about it. So I have really struggled.”
Image Credit: Theo Batterham
When I asked her about what she’s got planned for the year ahead, Caldarone responded; “Hopefully new music! I’d really like to put out an EP next year, so gotta get on that! And hopefully gigs! Oh, my god I’d love to do some gigs next year” she says, with a somewhat wistful sigh. “But yeah, just more songs really.” After a brief pause she reveals that she’ll be starting a radio show in 2021, on Garden Shed. “I’m gonna start just getting artists onto that and having fun with that. It’s my friend’s radio station, which is really cool because all of my other friends do a show on there.” Rounding off the interview she concludes, “Just more music, really. All good vibes!” Good vibes look pretty good from where I’m standing, and with the new year making way for a fresh start, hopefully live music will make a comeback too.
LISTEN TO ‘GIRLFRIENDS’ HERE: