Ahead of the release of their highly-anticipated EP, Year Of The Snake, the Canadian duo is back with new music.
Softcult has carved a name out for themselves as a band to watch. In their latest creative venture, the pair have written a track recognising the value of being authentic to yourself.
Explaining the purpose of the track, lead singer Mercedes Arn-Horne broke down the meaning behind the single.
“We wrote Perfect Blue about a time in our lives when we felt like nothing was in our control. In our previous project, we were signed to a label that butted heads with us creatively and wasn’t allowing us to express ourselves authentically,” she says.
“They weren’t interested in the music we were creating at the time, so we became unhealthily obsessed with trying to please them to release anything at all.”
Twin sister, Phoenix, elaborated on the intention of Perfect Blue: “It felt as though we were putting on an act to survive. We didn’t feel like our art was representing us. There was a lot we wanted to say, but it was being stifled. We felt like we’d lost our integrity. The song is a reminder to empower yourself by standing up for what you believe in, or risk losing yourself altogether.”
Taking to Twitter to announce the news, Mercedes revealed the track is “about changing for other people and losing ourselves in the process”.
Mercedes also offered an explanation behind the intentional visual used in the music video.
“I wanted the viewer to feel like they are entering the mind of someone who is watching themselves transform, powerless to stop their metamorphosis. I clearly remember times in my life when I felt pressure to become a version of myself that others wanted me to be, but that version wasn’t authentic to who I was,” Mercedes explains.
“I felt like I was losing my integrity and my sense of self. I’d look at myself in the mirror and be disgusted at what I saw, unattached to who. I had become. There’s a vibe of health anxiety, dysphoria, dissociation, a little horror element in there that I wanted to capture with the visuals. The skin peeling scenes are meant to elicit those feelings, like a snake shedding its skin.”
You can watch the music video for Perfect Blue here or below.
Related: Softcult: “Don’t try and be what someone tells you to be”
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