[Cover photo credit to Beehive Photography & Video]
Emily Hicks is a Utah-based Folk and Pop singer/songwriter who reflects on her experiences in her songwriting. Born and raised in a small Midwestern town, Hicks pursued music as a classical pianist and music educator before moving into songwriting.
In 2021, Hicks first released three singles produced by Grammy-nominated songwriter Monty Powell. Coming up, she will be releasing her debut album, Weird Wild Wonderful, on September 6th, 2024. The title track, “Weird Wild Wonderful You” is out now. For her new album, Hicks recorded at Dog House Studio in Nashville, and it was mixed at Freda Recording in Nashville.
Today, we’re very pleased to premier the new track “Anymore” from Hicks’ upcoming album, Weird Wild Wonderful. “Anymore” will arrive for streaming this Friday, July 19th, 2024.
The new track reflects in poignant detail on a shared childhood but in doing so also hints at how far life has developed since then, and how much, in turn, might still lie ahead. The sense of the unknown becomes the backdrop for the songs’ certainties of lingering emotion. Alongside Hicks’ choice of vocal dynamics, which often brings considerable emotion to the lyrics, there’s another very interesting side to “Anymore”, which is the difference between what “seems” to be real about another person and what they may actually be experiencing. The speaker in “Anymore” sees pictures that make their distant friend seem self-sufficient, even triumphant, but do we really know that’s true in this era of social media glamor?
Just as the song, sonically, balances softer and harder-edged elements, there’s a dualism in the song’s ideas, or, rather, two ways of looking at it. It could be taken as an internal lament for a lost relationship grown even more estranged over time, or it could be taken as a one-sided perspective on a relationship that might have been rekindled under different circumstances. That uncertainty leaves the audience to think about possibilities, and brings even more nuance to the song. Either way, the emotion of the original connection certainly remains, and we’re reminded that it’s up to us to find new ways to mold it into a positive thing.
Emily Hicks shares about the new song:
‘Anymore’ is a song for anyone who has grown apart from a childhood friend. In my case, it wasn’t for any particular reason other than “life happens”, but letting go of old realities and seeing friends flourish without us can be painful. However, the pain is bittersweet because at the end of the day, we want what’s best for the people we care about, and we love watching them mature into themselves – we just wish we could have been a part of it.
Emily Hicks continues to hone her craft as a songwriter and performs frequently at venues around Utah. With the release of her debut album Weird Wild Wonderful in the Fall of 2024, Hicks looks forward to touring different regions of the country in the hopes of connecting with new fans.
