💜Introducing: Anna Smyrk and poignant new single 'This is a Drill'💜
Introducing: Anna Smyrk and poignant new single 'This is a Drill'
Today, Naarm/Melbourne based singer-songwriter Anna Smyrk shares a poignant moment of catharsis with new single ‘This is a Drill’. The impressive indie-folk offering arrives along with news of a debut album on the way. Spectacular Denial with be out on the 20th of March via Community Music
Listen to This is a Drill HERE
Written in the wake of her father’s passing, ‘This is a Drill’ is born from the unrelenting impact of grief. The track moves from a quiet ache to a raw emotional unravelling, echoing the unpredictable ways that the pain of loss can take hold. Sharing more, Anna explained: “This is a Drill is a song about not being ready to feel my feelings. It’s about the strange, foggy state of denial, where everything feels a little unreal, like normal life is happening on the other side of a heavy curtain, like each day is a drill for the real thing.”
Arriving as a striking, indie folk slow-burner, courageously honest lyricism carries a tender reminder of the ways we cope or don’t when life cracks open. It’s both a whisper and a wail, a confession and a release. Produced and mixed by Anna Laverty (Courtney Barnett, Nick Cave), 'This Is a Drill' captures the suspended, dreamlike space between shock and acceptance.
Already road tested during the recent Community Garden Tour around Australia, the song has been quietly resonating with audiences. “People have come to talk after the shows about their own losses,” says Anna. “It’s like we can share a little moment of solidarity. Funnily enough, for a song about denial, people seem to feel a sense of release through it, which I really love.”
With a voice described by Rolling Stone as “truly astonishing,” Anna Smyrk has rapidly become one of Australia’s most compelling emerging artists. Her songs are replete with emotional, vulnerable lyrics, dynamic arrangements and undeniable hooks.
The past two years have seen Anna tour across North America, Europe and Australia, with official showcases at SXSW, Folk Alliance International and NXNE. She has toured non-stop, sharing stages with the likes of Birds of Tokyo, Strands of Oak, Tim Rogers and Bachelor Girl, performing at some of Australia’s finest festivals, Woodford Folk Festival, Port Fairy Folk Festival and more. Her 2023 EP Cortisol and Blue Light (recorded in Nashville with Jake Finch and Collin Pastore of boygenius/Lucy Dacus) received worldwide acclaim, charted on US college radio and earned playlisting on MTV.
‘This is a Drill, is the follow up to recent single ‘Garden Variety Grief’ which listeners were treated to back in October. Together the tracks take shape as an enticing teaser ahead of her first full length album ‘Spectacular Denial’ which is set for release on Friday 20th March. Shaped by her deeply personal journey with grief and her exploration of the many forms denial can take, the new album sonically sits in a rich space between indie, alt-pop, and folk, drawing inspiration from Blondie, Phoebe Bridgers, Garbage, Angie McMahon and Hozier.
With lots more to come in terms of music and touring, keep all eyes on Anna Smyrk;
Photo credit: Michelle Grace Hunder
