From the UK to the US, singer-songwriter, composer, and recording artist RØSES returns with an emotional and exhilarating sophomore single, "Creatures."
Striving to create a safe space for the LGBTQ+ community with her conceptual music, RØSES never fails to capture an audience's undivided attention with her words of wisdom and gripping, emotional scenes. The young queer artist is working on a narrative-driven series with accompanying music videos that follow a group of queer young adults navigating through life with lingering childhood trauma.
The series begins with her latest single, "Creatures," where RØSES breaks down the thoughts, pain, and experiences of a traumatic childhood and the mess that's left behind. RØSES' lyricism is top-tier; she has such a unique and distinct way of describing her thoughts and emotions that ultimately stops us dead in our tracks.
Taking a listen to her latest single, "Creatures," the song softly begins with a faint keyboard arrangement that melts through our speakers with incredible emotion. As RØSES makes her airy and bright vocal appearance, she begins to paint mental images of what we assume is a young RØSES enduring the painful emotions of a traumatic childhood and navigating her way through young adulthood with the lingering effects of her past.
As we move into the chorus, we're met with a bright, chilling, and bold electronic beat drop that cascades our speakers with brilliance and vibrance. This is definitely the climax of this emotional song. It perfectly amplifies the echoes of pain that RØSES continues to sing about, tugging on our heartstrings until the very last beat.
Feel part of something greater with help from RØSES' heartfelt and conceptual sophomore single, "Creatures," now available on all digital streaming platforms.
We're truly touched by the emotion and vulnerability within your latest single, "Creatures." Could you expand on what inspired you to create such a poignant and cathartic piece?
“Creatures” is actually an indirect sequel to a poem I wrote way back in 2017 ,“Red Ribbons”. I was working with an amazing LGBT+ non-profit at the time called Maven Youth, their mission being to create a pipeline for LGBT+ and minority youth into the tech industry. While being a youth leader at one of their free tech camps in Texas, I met the most incredible gender-queer person. I was shocked that at only 14, they had a maturity some people don’t have until their mid 20s. Over the two weeks of that camp, I got to know someone loving, kind and warm - constantly doing whatever they could to take care of the other youth around them. They brought such positive energy to the room, it was almost enough to distract from the barrage of extremely deep cuts and scars that covered a disturbing portion of their arms and legs.
The next year, they also became a youth leader and taught with me in Texas. As we became better friends, I got glimpses into their home life - with some of the struggles they were facing being scarily familiar to me. Even then, my friend made it a priority to emotionally support me during those two weeks as I struggled with untreated depression and severe bulimia. It was horrifying (but not surprising) to hear a year later that their home life had driven them to do something very...extreme. In the aftermath, their mother was acting clueless as to how it could’ve happened - garnering sympathy and support from those who would call her a “good mother” when I knew she’d known what had been going on and had chosen to do nothing. To add insult to injury, she was still invalidating my friend’s gender identity and misgendering them to anyone who would listen. It wasn’t the first time something like this had happened to someone I care about, and it’s definitely not a first when it comes to LGBT+ youth in general. It certainly won’t be the last, either.
“Creatures” is what I restrained myself from saying to my friend’s mother in anger. It’s what I am saying to all the parents/caretakers out there who choose to look the other way while their children are being abused, and don’t believe them when they have the courage to speak out.
Who produced the vibrant and powerful production within "Creatures"? Why did you choose to give the song this deep and gripping sonic edge?
I was very lucky to work with the amazing Brian Squillace of “LANNDS” on this track as well - he has an incredible knack for taking my lyrics and bass notes (somehow fully perceiving the vibe) and turning them into something fantastic.
From its conception, I knew I wanted “Creatures” to go suddenly from this ethereal, calm, “happy” tone to a darker, sadder, and more intense feel going into the bridge. As a listening experience, it’s the closest way I could think of to convey the shock of something so horrible hitting from “out of the blue”. If you’re giving your child the attention they deserve (or in this case, the lyrics), you’ll probably suspect this is leading somewhere bad. If not, I’m sure you’ll experience quite the shock - but what does that say about you?
Was it challenging to write such honest and emotional lyrics for "Creatures"? What was the most difficult part of your songwriting process?
It might sound strange, but I think the most challenging part was trying not to send the lyrics to my friend’s mother impulsively (I have extremely bad impulse control). Writing “Creatures” was my emotional output for processing and dealing with what happened to my friend. I was overwhelmed with the copious amount of anger and resentment I held for their mother, for everything that had happened - and for not somehow being able to do anything about it. I use “the dark” as a double meaning in the lyrics - in the case of my friend it didn’t mean suicide, but that’s not true for so many LGBT+ teens and young adults out there. To quote the Trevor Project, “more than 34,000 people die by suicide each year," making it "the third leading cause of death among 15 to 24-year-olds with lesbian, gay, and bisexual youth attempting suicide up to four times more than their heterosexual peers”. I wanted to use “Creatures” as an opportunity to bring even a small amount of awareness to this, even though it’s difficult to talk about.
What should we expect from your forthcoming narrative-driven series? How does "Creatures" prepare us for what's to come?
I’ve wanted to work on short films for the longest time, and I’m so excited to use my upcoming tracks as an opportunity to potentially do so! As of now, the story will center around four queer young adults, with the music video for each track focusing on a particular character, and what they’re going through. It’s still very early in the process right now, and so much is up in the air with the pandemic, but I’ve already gotten a good amount of support from friends/family (and maybe even cast some characters) - so hopefully you’ll hear more about the project in 2022!
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