“Sometimes you’ve got to express yourself because if you don’t you’ll explode,” says songwriter/producer Caroline Rose of their latest album, The Art of Forgetting. “…and I felt like I was going to explode.”
After a series of heartbreaking events, Rose had no desire to make a statement, let alone make a new album. It was a time of contemplation and transformation, a time to slow down. What transpired was what the artist considers a gradual union of reconnection and growth. “I was writing songs the way that I used to when I was a kid. It was more like therapy, just sitting down on my bed and writing about what I was feeling. It sounds so simple but I had really gotten away from that.” Dozens of songs followed and a narrative became clear. “It all happened very organically. I wasn’t ambitious. There weren’t any difficulties like most of my other records have had. This one just sort of appeared and seemed to know exactly what it needed to be.”
The Art of Forgetting is a pivotal release for Rose––an artist whose wit and satirical storytelling have made them a name in the indie music scene. It’s an album teeming with raw, intense emotion. Layers of vocal arrangements from Balkan-influenced yawps to Gregorian autotune choirs, acoustic instrumentation chopped and mangled like a glitching memory, and dreamlike synths push and pull to create a hugely dynamic soundscape. Lyrically, the album includes the type of confessional honesty we’ve only caught glimpses of in Rose’s previous work. “I’ve shied away from being very confessional in the past because I’ve always felt that other artists have already carved out that path and are very good at it. I’m a theater kid, I love the drama. My writing style really piggy-backs off the Southern gothics and Southern storytellers in my family, who have always used exaggeration to great effect.”
On sale 10am 20th Jan. Presented by Strange Days.
Artists on stage: 8.00pmCurfew: 11.00pm
Stage: The Venue