Saorsa
Saorsa has returned with her second hit single of 2021, Renegade. Renegade hits you hard with a powerful melancholy punch, covered in beautiful, atmospheric layers. Hazy Days Music would like to thank Sarah for taking the time out and having a chat.
It has been great watching you grow with every release. Where did Saorsa all begin? And could you share a little bit of how your journey has been along the way?
I'm from Sydney originally, and that's where Saorsa all started. I released my first single back in 2018, Ghost. When I released it, I had no real idea what I was doing. I just shared it on Facebook to my friends and family, just sort of like here is a song I wrote.
I planned for 2020 to be the big music year. I moved from Sydney down to Melbourne with the hope of taking a break from law, an indefinite break possibly. I wasn't sure. I have met some amazing musicians since moving down here and have been looking to start a new project (band) as well, but COVID obviously got in the way. But COVID didn't get in the way of my songwriting. I found it such a great outlet to have over that tough time. I'm releasing my debut EP, Call Me Out, very soon. All the songs were written over lockdown last year in Melbourne. I also had a few collaborations that happened last year, which were fun.
It's funny you put so much time and effort into some songs, and others like Strings Off are so easy, fun and quick to make. Strings Off just blew up when I released it. I feel like I never know the winning formula, haha.
It has taken me a long time to figure out my sound, what I want to say, and what type of message I wanted to have in my songs.
I can't get enough of your latest single, Renegade. I love the atmospheric layers and the way the whole song is put together. How was writing and recording this single? And what is the meaning behind the song?
Renegade is a song for anyone who wants to take a slightly different path that isn't conventional in life. Renegade is a reminder, and in the chorus, I have the words - I'm not a renegade or anything, but I'm not trying to behave. I kind of like that idea of you don't have to be the most out-there person in the room, not that there's anything wrong with that; that's beautiful in itself. But you don't have to be that, you can forge your own path forward, and it doesn't have to be the same as what everyone else is doing. It can be your path, and you don't have to abide by all these rules that society or your parents or your job or whatever it may be sets for you.
I wrote Renegade with my friends Tom Denning and Alex Walker. We met on a Melbourne Musicians Facebook group and got to hang out a few times before the lockdown started. Straight away, we had great songwriting chemistry and got along like old mates. Tom was playing me this riff over and over again on his acoustic guitar, and I was in love with how it sounded; it was such a vibe! I started singing almost instantly, and I think we wrote the whole song in about ten minutes. I sent the song to our producer friend Alex to see what he thought and if he could help us add a few more layers to the track. Alex was instrumental in creating that atmospheric texture to Renegade. Alex put it all together in his home studio, and we went to Small Time studio in Brunswick to record my vocals and redo the drums. We ended up recording all of my vocals for my upcoming debut EP over three days there at Small Time. It was so fun and a great experience. I may have been a bit pedantic in wanting to do a few more extra takes over the day, but everyone was really patient.
It was great to see that last year didn't stop you from releasing so much music. How different was releasing four singles over lockdown compared to a pre-COVID release?
No, COVID didn't stop me from putting everything out, haha. It did, however, impact the way you'd expected a release to go. I was really keen on gigging and getting to know some more venues and people in Victoria, which I didn't get to do and was a bit of a shame. I think it made me be a bit more innovative with the way I write music and collaborate.
Two of my songs last year were released by myself, and the other two were collaborations. It was an interesting challenge trying to organise all the different PR stuff around the collaboration singles. Like photoshoots, when we were all in lockdown in other cities, or wanting to go back into the studio to rerecord something, just wasn't an option anymore.
There was a lot of back and forth over some parts, but other parts were super easy and a welcome distraction from lockdown and everything going on. I enjoyed finding new ways to be innovative and find creative ways to build hype around a release.
How has your experience been collaborating with other artists? Do you have a preference over writing solo versus collaborating?
I started out by writing music by myself. I find writing melodies and lyrics comes super naturally to me. But when it comes to creating the instrumentation and building up layers to a song, I find it much more helpful collaborating on that side.
I love writing lyrics, and I love writing melodies. Sometimes I will labour away for a stupid amount of time over a few chords and still not be happy with it. That's the brilliant thing I think about the people I have collaborated with so far; they seem to be the opposite in writing the music first and waiting for lyrics and a melody to appear. Whereas, I hear that first, so it's kind of nice working together like yin and yang.
No one’s like, stay in your lane. If someone has lyric suggestions or instrument suggestions, everyone is super open to all the different ideas. It has been so lovely and so fun to work with everyone.
It must be great to finally play live again! How have your first couple of shows back been? Are you enjoying playing in Melbourne?
It’s so good to be back playing live!
I supported Lukas John at The Espy in The Gershwin room on the 5th of May. I had a bit of a medical thing the day of the show, where I was getting an iron infusion during the day because I had been really tired lately. A few hours before I am supposed to go on stage, I was lying in the doctors' office with all these tubes coming out of me, haha. But that was really fun show.
I opened for MOBS at The Howler in Brunswick as well, which was really fun, and my first sold-out gig, which was really exciting! The MOBS guys put on a great show. There was so much energy in the room that night and so lovely to feed off the crowd. I haven't really had that experience ever. I am grateful for every opportunity I get to play live, but when I started playing in Sydney, I was still pretty small and niche. The Howler was the largest crowd I have played in front of, and really great having people sing along to parts that they knew.
We played a lot of unreleased songs. We are keeping a few of the tracks on the EP a bit hush-hush still, but we are playing things that are so far in the future, that if we play them now, people will probably forget by the time they are out. So a few easter eggs in my set if people stayed tuned to what I'm doing, plus a couple of spicy covers get thrown in as well, you gotta chuck in one or two.
What are your plans for the rest of 2021? When can we expect your EP to be dropping? And any more collaborations on the way?
The 17th of June is when the EP will be coming out. I’ve got an EP launch show in the works, looking to play at the Workers Club towards the end of June, depending on lockdown restrictions. It’ll be good to have a few mates down and some friends supporting me, it’ll be nice to have a boggy and a fun night there. Check out my socials for all the latest information.
I have another collaboration coming out not too long after the EP drops as well. It's pretty different from all the music I have put out so far, a bit more electro, which isn't something that comes super naturally to me. I worked with Hylander on that track. He is so great at coming up with these insane, beautiful, melodic lines, and I just hear melodies over the top. So I am really keen for that to come out. That is what I love about collabs; they can take you into all these different directions and genres you wouldn't necessarily try or where you comfortably sit.
I have this other project in the works, which I can't say too much about just yet. Once this EP comes and has had its moment in the spotlight, we will be launching our debut single later in the year. Kind of a similar vibe to Renegade, more so branching into that indie-pop scene, rather than just full-on pop, which I think a lot of my music falls into genre-wise.
Stay up to date with Saorsa on Facebook, Instagram and Spotify.