Stream: Holly Blair, ‘Friday the 13th’

Kevin Bronson on May 23rd, 2023

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The weight of others’ expectations hangs over Holly Blair like a curse on her new single, “Friday the 13th.”

The follow-up to “Make It on My Own,” it’s just the third original released by the L.A.-based multi-instrumentalist, singer-songwriter and filmmaker. She’ll unveil her debut EP, “One Step Away Is Too Far” on June 2 via Future Gods.

The song was made with fellow singer-songwriter Charlotte Reed. “The song was originally just for fun, as Charlotte had expressed she wanted to get better at production so we sort of just went in with no expectations,” Blair explains. “You can hear that in the ending of the song where I’m laughing, it was truly just two friends in a basement messing around with an idea.”

Tim Carr (Perfume Genius, Fell Runner) applied the production finishing touches and did the guitar solo.

“Right before writing it me and Charlotte were talking about our respective avoidant tendencies and how that can make love hard,” Blair says. “We both sort of felt at times we were letting people down by not being what they wanted us to be all the time. Whether it be our families or partners, this idea of being a ‘good girl’ and how that just doesn’t feel authentic to us. So the chorus saying, ‘You got me feeling all kinds of bad’ is really about the guilt felt when you feel like you’re letting the people around you down by simply being yourself.

“I feel like, especially as women, we are raised to go into relationships and do whatever you can to make it work. We aren’t encouraged to walk away, and so I just want to say that it’s OK to walk away, even if other people might not understand. It doesn’t mean you failed, it just means that that chapter was meant to end. And in the loud ending of the song, I hope that reclaiming of power is felt.”

||| Stream: “Friday the 13th”