E^st is the multi-talented, untiring, idiosyncratic, indie artist you have been looking for.
This South African-born, Australian singer-songwriter and musician has music in her veins, as she has lived and breathed musical creativity her entire life. While as a child she began writing songs, her early teenage years consisted of publicizing her creativity in building an online presence.
E^st quickly ascended levels of popularity; from 2014-2018, she released four truthful and musically tactful EPs, several singles, and sundry collaborations, bringing her acclaim worldwide and the opportunity to open for musical icons such as Twenty One Pilots and Panic! at the Disco.
E^st has an original sound, one that is unapologetically her with each lyric, note, and rhythm. Her music is for all listeners, as she gifts us with tracks to laugh to, to cry to, and to dance to. Her spirit is uplifting, and her creativity is infectious to those in its presence.
Today, July 31st, E^st releases her debut album, entitled I’M DOING IT. This might be one of the most thorough and dynamic releases out there; over the course of thirteen songs, you fully feel the musical force that is E^st, and we cannot wait to see it top the charts.
E^st walks us through a storybook of her sensational release.
Fit For Company
I wrote this song alone in my bedroom one night, talking to my pain and trauma as if it’s a person and asking it to leave me alone. My music’s always been the way I express how I’m feeling and just as often it’s how I find out how I’m feeling. It’s very raw and sets the tone for the following journey of the record.
Flight Path
Flight Path was the first song I wrote with Jim on this album. it’s a bittersweet song that tells the story of going from being close and intimate with someone, to being complete strangers, and touches on the odd feeling of being alone again and all the possibilities that come with that. It was a sunny day in Sydney, and I think the sun found its way into the song. Although it sounds so fun and upbeat, the lyrics tell a different story, that contrast is something I’m naturally drawn to, I really love songs that feel bittersweet.
Maybe It’s Me
This song is about being a hot mess in life, and starting to wonder if maybe life has nothing to do with it and you just kinda suck. I wanted to write a song that laughed at feeling like a loser, maybe as a way to make it a little easier to admit. I had this chorus stuck in my head for ages, and when I expressed to Jim what I wanted it to sound like, the song pretty much wrote itself.
Found Somebody
This song was written on a rainy day in Jim’s little Welsh town. I was really inspired by the sound we created for this song, so a lot of the lyrics and melodies took its cue from the sonic world Jim was building. The first half of the album is about being a heartbroken mess as your life falls apart and this is one of the most emotional sounding songs on the record to me.
Fresh Out Of Love
This song is about feeling really empty after realising you’ve given all your love to someone who doesn’t love you back, it started with the title line and it was so easy to work from there. Those words had such a classic feeling to me, and I really wanted this song to be nothing more and nothing less than what it was.
I’m Not Funny Anymore
This song was really eye opening for me personally. It’s about realising someone isn’t interested in you anymore. That’s a really hard truth to face, and it’s important to have a wallow sometimes. The whole track is one take of me singing and playing piano at the same time. I wanted the recording to feel as honest as the song was trying to be.
Turn
This was another one take recording with me singing and playing guitar and was one of the last songs that got written for the album. I realised there was a story to the album, that the songs took on a more optimistic tone the more I grew as a person. So I wanted to write a song that singalled that. it’s the turning point of the album. The song is almost like a mantra. Almost like you’re convincing yourself that a change is possible with a conscious effort to do better and be better
Talk Deep
Talk Deep is probably the most fun song on the album and sometimes you just need a fun tune to boogie to in your life. We’d been tucked away in this studio hiding from the rain for weeks, writing sad song after sad song, and I wanted a day to break away from that. I was getting back in the zone of crushing on people and this song is about having crazy chemistry with someone and not wanting to miss out on a single second of it…
No One With You
I wanted this song to feel a bit trashy, kinda like how a rebound can feel sometimes (which is what this song is about).I was listening to heaps of emo music when I was making the album, and I think some of those influences found its way into this song.
Walking Home In The Rain
I’ve got a pretty vivid memory and this song is a pretty literal retelling of a night, I went to a friend’s party in an attempt to get out of my head, but being there just made it worse. When I decided to walk. It was raining and I was pretty miserable, I was listening to music but I was really numb to it. But then about halfway home, Virile by The Blaze came on, and as the song slowly builds, my spirits started to rise as well, by the end of the song it was like I was in a euphoric state, which lasted all the way home. There are moments on the album where the music really reflects the meaning and this was one of them.
Get Through
I wrote this song on my mum’s 100 year old piano, after that I took it to GarageBand and made a really simple demo with the piano, and like a drum and bass inspired breakbeat. It was written 3 days after a breakup. It wasn’t a nice breakup, and I think I had a lot of anger in me about how I’d been treated. Writing this song felt like an act of defiance, and it was the anthem that I needed at the time. Once I got Jim involved on the song, it went through a lot of different iterations, but in the end it ended up sounding pretty similar to that first demo.
I Wanna Be Here
I wrote this song at a really difficult time in my life, and it’s almost like I wrote the song that I needed to hear. I was going through a rough time, and was really struggling to feel connected to the world. By writing this song, I was writing a little bit of hope into my life… realising that just because life feels impossible, that doesn’t mean that it is impossible… And that as long as you’re trying something, there’s always hope
I’m Doing It
I actually wrote I’m Doing It probably a year before starting the album. It became the title track, and was probably the biggest personal milestone for me. The song’s about realising your own potential, and it seemed like the perfect sentiment to end on.
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story / Taylor Thompson
