On her debut solo album What A Relief, to be released on Saddest Factory Records, Katie Gavin proves herself as one of her generation’s most deft songwriters, able to articulate discomfiting feelings with grace and pragmatism. What A Relief scrutinises our collective need for intimacy and romance without judgment or harshness.
Today she releases ‘Casual Drug Use,’ the earliest written and one of the most infectious tracks on What A Relief. Written after a breakup in 2016, ‘Casual Drug Use’ is as anthemic as it is vulnerable, and recalls classic heartland rock and road songs like The Chicks’ ‘The Long Way Around.’
Gavin says this about the track: “This is a song about being young and on bad behavior, and the comfort of having friends by your side. I wrote it in 2016 after a day trip I took with a friend, and so I thought it would be sweet to film the video on a road trip I had planned with my childhood best friend. The different coloured potions in the video are meant to be a stand-in for whatever external substance we use to change our internal states.“
WATCH VIDEO FOR ‘CASUAL DRUG USE’ HERE
‘Casual Drug Use’ comes off the heels of ‘Aftertaste’ a song which indulges in the headrush of new romance, effortless in the way all Gavin’s best pop songs are. ‘Aftertaste’ leaps and stumbles forward toward desire, its recklessness part of the fun. “That song takes place inside of the magnetic force, when I’m really drawn to somebody and still feeling like it’s gonna work,” she says. “Sometimes it’s fun to surrender to that feeling – I think a lot of songwriters have a strong relationship with romantic fantasy.”
WATCH VIDEO FOR ‘AFTERTASTE’ HERE
Described, accurately, by Gavin as “Lilith Fair-core,” What A Relief taps into the unguarded self-possession and homespun pop sensibility of singers like Alanis Morissette, Fiona Apple and Ani DiFranco, and uses their tenacity as a North Star for Gavin’s own trek towards self-discovery.
DEBUT SOLO ALBUM
WHAT A RELIEF OUT OCTOBER 25TH
VIA SADDEST FACTORY RECORDS
What A Relief Tracklisting
- I Want It All
- Aftertaste
- The Baton
- Casual Drug Use
- As Good As It Gets ft. Mitski
- Sanitized
- Sketches
- Inconsolable
- Sparrow
- Sweet Abby Girl
- Keep Walking
- Today
Follow Katie Gavin:
