KEZRA Wows Me With “Back Home”

Take a moment to stop what you’re doing and listen to “Back Home,” the latest single from Naarm/Melbourne singer-songwriter KEZRA. This is a song that deserves more than becoming the background of your workday or late lunch. It demands your full attention so can catch every lyric, every emotion, every note. I’ve got chills.

“I started writing this song on the floor of my living room, strumming along on my guitar, but feeling very uninspired during lockdown. So, I plugged in my vocal harmoniser pedal, in the hope that it would give me some inspiration and help me write in a more creative way. It first began with the slow paused chord changes on the guitar. Then the lyrics – ‘I was taken back to the house where we met’ came to me whilst using my harmoniser and this instantly set the tone for where the rest of the song needed to go,” KEZRA explained.

“There was something special about the imperfect and mechanical sounding harmonies, that made these lyrics hit deeper. The guitar pauses are almost echoing that feeling of being stuck, reminiscing on the past, replaying old memories in your mind and not being able let go. Towards the end, the strumming is so aggressive with distortion, building up with anger, kind of like a cry for help by the end of the song.”

I’m pretty excited about this song. It’s truly special. I’d almost forgotten that I wrote about KEZRA’s music before the pandemic, but she’s definitely back on my radar after hearing this.

Image used with permission from Good Intent; credit: Corey Adams

Sarah King Impresses With “Back Home”

British-born Adelaide-based pop-jazz chanteuse Sarah King has won me over with her beautiful new single “Back Home.”

It’s the kind of song that stops you in your tracks because it’s so different from what other people are releasing. Her voice is just beautiful, angelic and ethereal.

“The single ‘Back Home’ is pretty special to me as I wrote it at a time where I was settling myself and my family into South Australia, our new home state,” Sarah explained in a press release. “I started exploring themes of home and what home means to different people, whether it’s a place, a person or something completely unique. It’s a song about what and where home can be, a story of longing, reminiscing, reflection, acceptance and gratitude.”

Sarah hopes “Back Home” can also help raise awareness for the thousands of women homeless in South Australia and the rest of the country. She performed the track at Umbrella Winter City Sounds last month to further the cause.

There’s more where that came from on Sarah’s self-titled EP. She’ll officially launch that at the Wheatsheaf Hotel in Thebarton on August 27.

Image used with permission from Against the Grain Publicity/Photo credit: Hannah Tunstill