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Lucy Rose reflects on the scary experience of releasing an emotional album

Words by Jessica Over

“I’m looking for someone to understand it.”

To release an album into the world expressing your most personal feelings is an admirable, if daunting, act. It’s not for everyone. But for English singer-songwriter Lucy Rose, it’s the perfect outlet. Rose’s latest record may be called No Words Left, but she doesn’t need anything but music to vocalise the kind of emotions we can all relate to. Sharing it with the world, however, is another challenge altogether.

“I think I still find the whole thing quite scary,” says Rose. “It’s always a bit nerve-wracking, but I think with this record being so exposing and so open, it’s just taken it to a new level of scariness. I guess also a need for somebody to like it more than anything else I’ve done before, just one person, because it’s so me and it’s so honest. I’m looking for someone to understand it, if that makes sense.”

As a musician, inspiring that level of understanding often means baring your soul in what can be an uncomfortably public manner. No Words Left achieves this more seamlessly than most, a feat that can be attributed to Rose’s understanding of how her music sits in the current social landscape.

“I think it’s difficult for anybody to talk about these sort of feelings,” she says. “Generally, with whatever troubles people are going through, it’s really hard to find an outlet for them. So on one hand I feel very grateful that I have an outlet, which is being able to write about it in some way and let it out, and then on the other hand I feel terrified that it is so open, that it goes out to the world. I guess within that I just try and remind myself of the people that will enjoy it. That’s the reason why it’s worth releasing, for the people that do relate to it and do understand it.”

No Words Left seems destined to become a record that is intrinsically relatable, from its unabashed display of emotion through to its heartfelt expressions of hardship. But one especially noteworthy aspect is the album’s focus on the obstacles women continue to face in today’s society. It’s an all too prevalent issue that Rose addresses with intellect and delicacy in ‘Treat Me Like A Woman’, where she draws inspiration from the tiny incidents in life that are at best irritating, and at worst indicative of a worryingly problematic mindset.

“I feel like I’ve been writing it [‘Treat Me Like a Woman’] in my head or understanding that feeling for a long time, which is, ‘Was I just treated differently because I was a girl?’” says Rose.

“I think the main problem is it’s hard to get so angry because a lot of the time all of it is quite meaningless, and when you correct someone on it, they go, ‘Alright, yeah,’ and it’s not a big deal to anybody else. It doesn’t feel like that at the time. When small things are happening, it feels completely encompassing. But to everyone else, it’s quite minor and they don’t really know what you’re moaning about … It is important to talk about it but at the same time, it’s complex.

“I think sometimes it’s just about picking your battles and making small, everyday reminders to people that you’d prefer to be treated differently or treated as an equal. I think that can be more powerful than letting it build up and explode.”

After any battle comes a time for reflection, and No Words Left epitomises this experience. Its purpose is expression, detailing profound emotions with which we as listeners can identify, and it’s this affinity that Rose hopes fans will find at her live shows as she embarks on an Australian tour this month.

“What I’m hoping for is — because I don’t know if it will happen — is for there to be people at the shows who like the record and like the songs and enjoy hearing them,” she says. “Because that’s the reason I’m here, to be able to play music, and at the moment the thing I’m fighting with is you always think, ‘I want to come all this way and I want to make people happy by being here.’ However, it’s more complicated than that because these songs and everything are so deep and also quite sad at times.

“The shows aren’t necessarily just about happiness, and that’s a big thing that’s difficult about it. I hope that it means something to somebody. That’s what I would hope.”

No Words Left is out now via Communion. 

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