Olivia Reid forges meaningful musical and human connections with her new EP To Be Named By The People — showcasing today on Tinnitist.
On the indie-pop artist’s latest release, Reid unpacks emotions or experiences that are multi-layered — connecting the times where exhaustion co-exists with adrenaline, pain coexists with healing, grief coexists with joy, dreams coexist with unrest, and madness coexists with clarity. Reid’s cinematic and ethereal production styles take a similar approach, where organic elements collide with electronic concrete and synthetic textures. Reid’s unique and boundary-pushing production style in To Be Named By The People adds another dimension to her music, where organic elements seamlessly collide with electronic textures, creating a soundscape that envelopes listeners.
Reid sought the opinion of her fans to title her latest record, using To Be Named By The People as a placeholder. To her surprise, fans overwhelmingly agreed the working title should stay, creating a project name that allows listeners to choose their own title based on what the songs mean to them. Having already received widespread acclaim for her previously released singles featured on the EP, Reid impresses with tracks like Runner’s High, a dynamic journey that reflects on her pursuit of progress and the motivation that comes with accomplishing goals. Wounds (Healing) artfully intertwines pop sensibilities with soft electronic rhythms and jazzy undertones as Reid explores her relationship with anxiety and painful memories. Not one to shy away from experimentation, Nightmare Machine offers listeners a unique opportunity to embrace collective restlessness. The song’s expressive vocal delivery, paired with electronic accents and intricate folky-instrumentation, is reminiscent of indie-folk icons Bon Iver and Florence + The Machine.
To Be Named By The People presents two brand-new tracks, Madness (Act I), written, produced, and performed by Reid herself, and Madness (Act II + III), a track Reid co-produced with collaborator The Grand Mess. In this three-part journey, Reid delves into the concept of madness as a pathway to healing. “A few years ago, I wandered into a conversation about madness at a neuroscience convention in Berlin. One of the speakers was talking about how madness doesn’t have a true definition, and anyone who we may deem mad as a society may very well just be living within a different way of being, in their own universe,” explains Reid. “I started to write a story from the third person in three acts, detailing this fictional character losing their mind. But midway through writing I found moments of non-fiction within the story, and I changed the third person pronouns into I statements. Suddenly it was me who was losing my mind alone in the woods in Act I.”
Act I follows Reid as a characterized version of herself hiking in the woods — marked by the shuffle of her feet against the gravel and the percussive clang of her bear-deterrent bell. Blaming the loneliness of the woods as the cause of her lunacy, Reid sets her sights on the city. Act II drops Reid into the middle of the city’s chaos, “lost and cold” like everyone else. She realizes the sensation of madness was never loneliness but rather was a signal of healing, exploring how a broken mind may find the sensation of healing to be so foreign, it seems mad. But by Act III, Reid turns to face the “madness,” realizing that it might not be madness at all, just an evolution. The three-part song ends with a plea from the world to “come back to Earth,” to which Reid replies — “I can only try.” Reid’s hauntingly soothing vocals, coupled with her deeply personal lyrics, create an immersive experience that resonates deep within the soul. Blending indie acoustics with bold electronic pop soundscapes, Reid crafts a visceral sonic world that leaves an ineradicable impression on listeners.
Cheak out To Be Named By The People above, hear more from Olivia Reid below, and connect with her on her website, Facebook, Twitter, TikTok and Instagram.
