Featured Photo Credit: Karina Barberis
Before Orla Gartland drops her highly anticipated debut album ‘Woman on the Internet’ on August 20, the Dublin singer-songwriter-producer has released her brutally honest new single “You’re Not Special, Babe.”
The enlightening and comforting track is pulled straight from Gartland’s own self-discovery.
“Growing up is weird and my twenties feel like chaos,” Gartland shared, “’You’re Not Special, Babe’ is a coming-of-age song written to remind myself that everyone goes through all of it; good times, bad times, strange times, dizzying highs & extreme lows. The title sounds mean but it’s really meant to be a comforting message!”
Gartland’s lyrical candor is matched by collaborator Tom Stafford’s writing and production and her band infusion of, “everything I love,” Gartland gushed, “ethereal synths, shimmery guitars, harmonies, tiny drums and big drums. I cannot wait to play this song live.”
The sound and the story layed out in “You’re Not Special, Babe,” provides a road-map for the upcoming album as she navigates, “the chaos of my 20s.”
Gartland also took on the role of co-director for the accompanying choreographed music video. “I directed the video for ‘You’re Not Special, Babe’ with my best friend and creative director Greta Isaac. I love working on these visuals with Gret because she knows me and these songs so well. In the song I sing lyrics directed at myself but for this video we dreamed up a movement-based piece (choreographed by Elan Isaac) that personifies the voices in three clowns (played by incredible dancers Hannah Hornsby, Kyll Thomas-Cole and Anaïs Reymond).”
Gartland continues, “The clowns appear in my space and initially seem to pester me; we wanted the clowns to feel like friends trying to drag me out of a dark place, rejected at first but embraced in the end. At the end of the video I’ve joined them and seem vibrant, positive and back to my old self – at which point the clowns have done their job and disappear. This video presented us with challenges but it was all so worth it in the end.”
Whether it is this track or her upcoming album, Gartland hopes, “for people to come away understanding me more, but also it doesn’t have to be all about me. Even if it’s the odd lyric here and there, I’d love it if people felt more understood just by listening to the album.”