Q&A: Sabrina Song’s EP 'When It All Comes Crashing Down' is a Vessel for Healing
ABANDONED PARTIES, FIGHTING OVER THE PHONE, STAYING IN BED — in the face of imminent disaster, unpacking old resentments. Sabrina Song is attuned to the small moments. In her new EP, When It All Comes Crashing Down, the indie singer-songwriter quietly conjures a portrait of a relationship, fragile in its venomousness, throughout its many lives. Listeners bear witness as Song treads lightly with a toxic partner and ultimately advocates for her needs. A masterful songwriter ever-leaning toward lyrical precision, Song probes at her own fundamental anxieties while standing firmly in a newfound self-championship.
In “Doors,” Song employs paraphrasing to deliver a forceful, if hushed, evisceration of her partner. She arrives suddenly and strongly at a sense of clarity: “We all have hard times / We all have dark times / But I never said the things you said.” A ticking, isolated drum beat speaks to the imminent end of this relationship and to the overwrought behaviors that will be its demise. Song’s muse is a person who locks the car doors as a partner tries to leave, who is seldom satisfied and soon to be left.
This latest project explores the urge to orchestrate perfection in relationships, an urge intensified by the demands of being a woman. Song fears for what happens when performed radiance gives way to the actuality of who she is; she wonders if her partner will stay despite her eroding novelty. But she doesn’t arrive at an answer — in fact, Song never really looks for them, instead providing catharsis simply by making private fears public.
Produced and engineered by Song herself, When It All Comes Crashing Down possesses a delicate, thrumming sound that blends the sparsity of Mitski's “Class of 2013” with the warmth of early Carole King. The tracks only crescendo when a situation absolutely calls for it; the sonic landscape has the same elusiveness of a partner just trying to keep the peace. When the production does finally erupt, it is somehow hopeful.
Song has been featured on NPR's Tiny Desk contest, in which Phoebe Bridgers expressed her support, and i-D Magazine included her track “Down” on their GUi-DE. Read below to find out more about Song’s writing process and how she is coming into her own.
LUNA: How did you get into music when you were younger? What were some formative experiences you feel drew you toward songwriting?
SONG: I always grew up super musical. I was singing from my earliest memories and my mom put me in local theater productions, like the community theater, and I played violin and piano. But I didn't really start writing or even exploring the thought of writing until high school, or even halfway through high school. I just had a great music teacher in this one small elective who really encouraged me to try keeping a journal and taught me the basics of using Logic and recording. That was kind of the first time I shifted away from just singing covers and doing plays, and [I] kind of realized that was really what I was drawn to.
LUNA: I read that you engineered and produced your new EP, When It All Comes Crashing Down. I feel like that's incredible, that autonomy of being able to completely manufacture what you want for your sound.
SONG: In the beginning of making music I was not a producer, and I just knew that if I could crack that skill I could unlock something creatively for me. So I definitely see it as part of the songwriting process now, but it took a long time to get there.
LUNA: You’re based in Brooklyn — what’s the music landscape like there? I know you've performed at Elsewhere and The Sultan Room, these very iconic New York places.
SONG: It's really interesting. I'll be listening through my Discover Weekly and every day I'll come across someone, look them up, and they're based in Brooklyn. I feel like the indie scene is very [much] thriving here — there’s a community aspect to it. The venues you were naming are such great launchpads for local artists — they really prioritize people on the same level as me.
LUNA: In your music video for “Down,” I loved the imagery of the ballerinas and how they represent this kind of performed perfectionism and ease. What were your intentions in writing the song, and how did you come up with this visual element of ballet dancers?
SONG: It's kind of like a worst fear song. I was a few months into a new relationship and just having this feeling of… you know, when you meet someone when you're consciously in a great place mentally, and at the beginning, everything is going great. And it's like: there’s going to be only harder experiences from this point on. We can only go down from here in what we would have to go through together or the things that we'll have to rely on each other for. For the video, in terms of the ballet I feel like there’s an element buying into the fantasy of perfection. There's a suspension of disbelief that their feet are probably hurting and that it is not easy and elegant. And yet you're enjoying the performance because that's what you're supposed to do, and that's what they prepared for. Striving for perfection is something I felt like I was doing, and also something that I try to dismantle from my thinking now: needing to be on all the time or never letting people down.
LUNA: For the EP, what kind of feeling are you hoping to elicit from listeners?
SONG: The EP came together in my first year out of college. A lot of my friends were moving away, my family was moving; it felt like I was navigating this change, entering this new period. And I think these songs are me exploring and working through these evolving relationship dynamics of being fully in adulthood, being in my first serious relationship of adulthood; everything kind of changing. Even though it's specific, I wanted listeners to feel like, “Wow, I've never thought about it that way.” It might not be the exact relationship that the listener has had, but I just wanted to help people process similar complicated situations they had found themselves in. And I would just hope that any or all of the songs resonated.
LUNA: Who are some of your biggest sonic inspirations, and do you feel like your sonic inspirations or influences shift as you get older?
SONG: Definitely some core people are Joni Mitchell and Billy Joel; Carole King. And then the whole time I've been making music, major inspirations have been Mitski, Adrianne Lenker, and The 1975, too, in terms of writing and production. I'm really drawn to people who create these worlds within a song and have these simple lines that can be so devastating. I feel like all of those people are pretty lyric driven artists — I love artists whose lyrics are at once specific and universal.
LUNA: What does your writing process look like? Are there times when you set out to write a song or does it unfold more organically?
SONG: Usually what happens is while a feeling or situation is unfolding, when I'm actually away from my computer or piano, that’s when I’ll get an idea. When I'm alone on transit or walking or laying in bed processing, I'll just have a line or a section of words and melodies that I'll sing into my phone or write down in my notes. Then later I’ll figure out, “Okay, what are the chords for this?” I have to unpack the idea and usually get the whole song written first, and then start producing it as soon as I've got that.
LUNA: Do you feel like this EP differs from past projects you've put out? Do you think it's an extension of them, or do you feel like it's like a departure from the things that you've already released?
SONG: I feel like it's probably somewhere in between. I actually feel like probably the next thing I'll put out is the full departure, and this EP felt like the buildup for me. But every time I would work on it, [it] felt like I was breaking new ground for what I wanted, and I'd never been so excited about what I was working on. It felt like unlocking a new kind of freedom with my writing and just letting myself really explore the whole breadth of my feelings — because my writing used to feel insular. I would write only about my inner monologue and my fears and not really explore my relationships with other people. I just didn't trust my own opinion — I always felt like I was in the wrong — but I think this project really solidified my ability to process those situations and not always blame myself alone. I feel like I have the confidence to write with more conviction now.
LUNA: Your growth as a person could directly reflect and impact your growth as an artist — that's really beautiful.
SONG: Exactly. Before, I wouldn't even like to tell people that I made music because I just felt like I couldn't stand in that identity. And I think I honestly wasn't being proud enough of what I was doing, where[as] now I realized that I need to feel like the songs are undeniable to me.
LUNA: Do you feel like there's a song off your EP that's most emblematic of the project?
SONG: All the songs serve different purposes to me. I think the song that was the centerpiece while I was creating it was “Doors.” I think there was just something about it that kept drawing me back even though it was a bit different from what I've been doing. Instrumentation-wise it was unexpected, at least to me. I just felt the most excited about it and really loved the song.
LUNA: Personally, musically, what are you looking forward to in the next year?
SONG: I want to try to play a lot of live shows and try out some of the new unreleased songs live and see how they go. I'm trying not to rush myself into releasing another million songs right away. I’m trying to put together a full-length project and see what happens if I just focus on writing and not think immediately about releasing this year. But yeah, I'm just really looking forward to playing a bunch of shows and experimenting with these new songs. It’s also gonna be fun to do really cool writing and production work with other artists that I'm excited by. Since I don't really collaborate on my stuff, it's super fun to do it for other people's projects.
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