Gothic pop singer-songwriter Venus Blake leans into the dark spaces of the human psyche on compelling, authoritative debut album The Other Side of Midnight — showcasing today on Tinnitist.
Filled with outsider anthems and tales of isolation, chaos, addiction and lost love, this album is fueled by Blake’s fiery lyricism and powerhouse vocals. Venus is a multi-instrumentalist, handling piano and guitar duties on this release, which also features bass and production by Lex Mars.
The Other Side of Midnight offers an intimate look into the heart of the modern-day outsider, capturing the alienation, melancholy, solitude and angst of the artist, living in a world gone mad, and facing their demons with a devil on one shoulder, the muses on the other. Love, loss, heartbreak, melancholy, alienation, addiction, isolation but also hope, ecstasy, the devotion to beauty and the hidden magic of life come together to make a harrowingly honest and intimate look into the darkest corners of the soul. Blake’s intense vocals, expressive mastery of the piano, and dark lyrics front and center on this voyage through The Other Side of Midnight.
Fittingly written after midnight and recorded in a bohemian attic in the Italian countryside, The Other Side of Midnight harks back to the golden age of singer-songwriters of the ’70s (Carole King, Elton John,) and of the ’90s (Tori Amos, Fiona Apple). The minimalist productions create a haunting atmosphere, while Blake combines her piano magic with powerhouse vocals and a gift for capturing the essence of emotion in her words and music.
As Venus says: “Singer-songwriters are like modern-day troubadours, wandering around the world, and writing our songs about the highs and lows of the human condition, we’re like the chroniclers of humanity, recording our own deepest experiences, thoughts and emotions and crystallizing moments and feelings into four-minute songs.”
With a soul of a poet, the stature of a vampire and eyes of a fallen angel, Blake was born in 1997 and raised in London. She is currently living a bohemian lifestyle in Italy. A classically trained pianist, she started playing at the age of five, and briefly experimented with violin, organ and cello. Undecided whether to become an opera singer, a poet or a concert pianist, she found her true calling in pop music, writing her first song — called Moonlight Whispers — at the age of nine.
A wild child in her teens, she ran away from home at 16 to pursue her music, and travelled around Europe performing with tribute bands, playing in piano bars and sometimes busking, something her gypsy soul found extremely poetic. She wrote songs for other artists and bands and worked as a session musician while refining her craft as a songwriter, pianist and vocalist. While in Italy, she met Italian music producer Lex Mars; this was the catalyst that brought Venus’s music to the forefront.
In the rare moments where she’s not making music, Venus loves reading obscure books, studying philosophy, writing endless poetry, going on long road trips with no destination, exploring ruins, watching sunsets from rooftops, getting completely lost in nature and dancing in the pouring rain. She speaks five languages, is an inveterate bookworm, and will soon release a compilation of poetry as a companion to her album.
Hear The Other Side Of Midnight below, watch the video for Tragedy above, and find Venus Blake at her website, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
