We’re very pleased to premiere ‘Calm Down’, the new single from Australian-born, Berlin-based percussionist and songwriter Eilis Frawley – and there’s an extra reason for LOUD WOMEN readers to pay attention. Frawley will be joining us at LOUD WOMEN Fest Newport at Le Pub on 3 October.
If modern life has left you feeling like your brain has 36 tabs open, somebody is shouting from each of them and at least six are trying to sell you something, ‘Calm Down’ may strike a nerve.
Built around Frawley’s sharply controlled percussion and direct spoken-word delivery, the track digs into the increasingly blurry boundary between information and manipulation. A taut, kraut-influenced rhythm ticks insistently underneath while Frawley questions who gets our attention, who decides what appears in front of us and how much of what we think we have chosen has actually been chosen for us.
“They say truth is information, but isn’t it tailored by design?”
It’s an unsettling question, and ‘Calm Down’ wisely doesn’t attempt to package up a reassuring answer. Instead, the song sits inside the discomfort. The percussion is precise but restless, creating a kind of low-level tension while Frawley’s voice remains impressively unruffled above it. The effect is almost contradictory: music about information overload that refuses to contribute to the noise.
Frawley says the song was prompted by a world of “news, strong opinions, notifications, and algorithms”, all fighting for a piece of our increasingly knackered attention spans. Their proposed act of resistance is wonderfully simple: sometimes you can simply refuse to engage.
There’s something satisfyingly subversive about that idea. We’re constantly told to react, comment, share, consume, optimise and form an immediate opinion on absolutely everything. ‘Calm Down’ suggests that declining the invitation might be an act of power in itself.
Frawley is a classically trained percussionist who has lived in Seoul and Berlin, and has drummed with artists including Anika, Laura Lee and The Jettes and Kara Delik. Their own work places rhythm front and centre, using it as the framework for observations on feminism, social structures, identity and the less charming bits of being a person in the modern world.
‘Calm Down’ is the second taste of Frawley’s forthcoming second album, following ‘Guilt’, and it makes an intriguing case for what comes next.
And if you fancy experiencing those drums at considerably closer range, catch Eilis Frawley at LOUD WOMEN Fest Newport, Le Pub, Saturday 3 October, alongside 1blackfrend, Cape Orange, emmy woods, Hairdye, I, Doris, Lady Garden, Local Rainbow, ScareBears, SheBeat and The Nanaz.
