‘Wondering’, is the woozy second single from Thea Gustafsson’s project, Becky and the Birds. Released today via 4AD and alongside visuals directed by Danica Arias Kleinknecht, ‘Wondering’ is a poetic lament charting a deeply sorrowful period for the Swedish pop producer and songwriter following the death of a beloved relative.
Gustafsson explains, “I wrote this song after I lost my grandmother, which was the first time that I experienced the death of a loved one. My grandmother was my best friend and such a light in my life, so losing her was really, really difficult for me. I didn’t know how to deal with the complete emptiness and confusion that I felt. That’s when I wrote this song, I just felt like I had to find different ways of coping, and thinking about the good times and the beautiful memories instead of what could’ve been. That’s why I’m hoping that this song will reach anyone who’s experienced loss of a loved one. We’ve gotta come together and focus on the good and the beautiful marks that they’ve left in our lives and hearts, cause they will never be taken from us.”
Born in the mid-nineties, Thea Gustafsson was raised in Örebro, a small city in the middle of Sweden. Her musician father immersed her in music from infancy, playing jazz and soul records at home. Gustafsson’s musical education become more formalised when she picked up the violin at age 7, leading her to perform in orchestras and master classical arrangement and composition. A move to Stockholm in 2014 to attend Musikmakarna – a renowned music school in Sweden’s capital – exposed her to pop music for the very first time, coming face-to-face with music epitomised and made famous by the likes of Max Martin and Aviicii (she spent an eye-opening year as an intern with the latter during her second year of study). Armed with skills in pop songcraft and production, Becky and the Birds came to life in reaction to frustrating and fruitless encounters with producers and songwriters in what remains an overwhelmingly male-dominated music industry.
As with previous single ‘Do U Miss Me’, Gustafsson wrote and produced ‘Wondering’ which is available today via all digital platforms.
