We got swept up in the seasons earlier this month, with the release of Amy Grace’s debut EP.
A poignant account of the ever-changing life of a 20-something, the incisive seven-track project brims with warm immediacy and vulnerability, and kickstarts what’s feels like a breakout moment Amy Grace, one of Sydney’s most promising Sydney singer-songwriter.
Taking a peak behind the curtain of her artistry, we caught up with Amy Grace for a track-by-track rundown of each entry on seasons, from the one song that recounts “the uncomfortable transitions in life” to the ballad delivered “in its rawest form.”
Catch Amy Grace’s full track breakdown below, and scroll down to listen to her new EP seasons.
intro
I’ve always loved albums that have intro tracks so this was honestly just my producer Ben and I messing around with some synths and some electric guitar.
We originally had some vocal layers in there as well but we decided to take those out and leave it as an instrumental. When I became an aunty in 2020 it threw me into this wonderful new season in my life and I am now an aunty to two beautiful girls.
I love playing a big role in their lives and they are such a big part of mine so I really wanted to include them in this album somehow. The little audios you hear throughout the intro are cute moments I had with them that I managed to capture.
seasons
I wrote seasons in April 2022 and it immediately felt right to make it the album title. It was originally inspired by a falling out I had with a couple of friends.
They were some of my closest friends at the time and I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to that season in my life because we’d made some really amazing memories together.
There’s this natural imagery of seasons that runs throughout this song with the season of ‘summer’ being used as a metaphor for the way it felt like when we were all close.
The lines later in the song referencing autumn, ‘now the leaves are turning all different colours’ and winter, ‘so I’ll bring back the layers, to keep myself warm’, are to capture how it felt after we fell out.
The core concept explored in this song is change and how a lot of the time it’s out of our control. And as much as we may want to hold onto what we had there are some things we have to let go of and move on from.
This song ends on the optimistic notion of letting go and embracing the uncomfortable transitions in life knowing that it inevitably makes us grow as individuals.
getting older
When I wrote this song I was really missing my nana who we lost to cancer at the end of 2019. I was playing around with the chords from ‘seasons’ and ended up writing these lyrics to the same melody as an add-on to the title track.
We debated whether or not to record this properly in a studio but decided to keep this song in its rawest form, using the original voice memo that I recorded on my phone in May 2022.
She had such a strong and beautiful presence in my life and this song is a tribute to her.
rooftop
There was one apartment my family lived in where we had a balcony that connected to the rooftop and I absolutely loved that spot because we had a 360˚ view of the sky which was especially breathtaking at sunset.
I love being in nature and it was beautiful up there amongst the trees so I spent a lot of my afternoons and evenings there writing and playing.
Lyrically ‘rooftop’ is quite straightforward, simply expressing the calming and grounding effect that being present in nature often has on me.
Looking back ‘rooftop’ was one of the songs we struggled with the most when it came to production. We had a few different ideas and versions of it before we decided on the final composition, but in the end we were really happy with how it ended up sounding.
a moment or two
This song is written about those moments in life when everything feels a little crazy and overwhelming and you just need a moment to slow down and catch your breath.
Around the time I wrote this song my family were moving apartments quite a bit and it was hard to keep settling into a new place and then having to move again.
I wrote this song on the rooftop referenced in the previous track around the time I found out we had to move again and it’s me saying goodbye to that space and all the things I loved about it.
With each move I was reminded that having a place that feels like home is so important but any space can eventually feel like home if you’re surrounded by your people.
weathered
This song was written during the three month lockdown in 2021 and was originally going to be the title track before ‘seasons’ was written.
My mental health like many others took a dip during those three months and I spent a lot of time alone in my room feeling very lost and low.
I could go line by line and explain all the double meanings within the lyrics but the line ‘cause life seems to have lost all its colour’ most accurately articulates the lockdown experience for me.
Towards the end of ‘weathered’ I talk about the rain which in this context is symbolic of growth and cleansing.
After the rain the grass, plants and trees always seem so refreshed and nourished and the smell after rain is something that I want permanently tattooed in my brain.
This imagery and this song took on new meaning when lockdown eventually ended and everything slowly started to feel normal again.
It made me appreciate all the small things and become more intentional with how I spent my time and who I spent it with. The whole Covid experience made me feel like I’d mentally aged a decade and is one of the reasons the song got its title.
dance in the rain
The rain from the end of ‘weathered’ made for a perfect transition into ‘dance in the rain’ so it made a lot of sense to have them run after each other.
Ben and I both stepped out of our comfort zones and challenged ourselves with the production on this one, but we’re so happy with how it ended up sounding.
I wrote this song in my bedroom at night when it was storming and I remember thinking, ‘I would really love to go out and dance in the rain right now’.
I love the rain and we often see movies romanticise being rained on and using rain as pathetic fallacy to amplify a characters feelings, so I also had this in my mind when I was writing.
I find evenings so peaceful “I find peace in the night” so I do a lot of writing in this space because it’s where my mind is at ease.
I feel as though when it storms, it’s nature releasing emotions as well, which is why the following line is “Lately it seems, so does the sky”.
I believe staying in touch with your inner child is so important and there’s something so innately human about dancing in the rain that helps me reclaim that feeling of childhood. It makes me feel so grounded and present which is always a beautiful feeling.
close the door
The final track was inspired by the same friendship fallout I wrote about in ‘seasons’. I wrote this song several months after and I think I had been holding onto this idea of what could’ve been.
I was still grieving those friendships and I wasn’t ready to close that chapter but I knew I had to because I needed to move on and make room for new friendships.
I loved the idea of opening and closing the album on these two songs because it feels like your experiencing this chapter with me.
You hear about the beginning, you see the waves of emotions through the other tracks and then you see me closing that chapter or rather, season. We felt as though it was the perfect ending for this concept and for this album.
