PHOTOGRAPHY Erica Snyder
“Bring back crying!” proclaims singer-songwriter Hope Tala. While this could be misinterpreted as a call for help, it’s far from it – instead, her poignant new single ‘I Can’t Even Cry’ hears Tala reflect on a period of her life where she struggled to express her feelings. “I’m a very sensitive person who always turns on the waterworks, often when I don’t want to, but because of what was happening in my life at the time, I wasn’t able to because I felt numb and detached from my feelings,” she explains.
‘I Can’t Even Cry’ is an introspective look at Tala’s inner monologue while recovering from a tumultuous heartbreak. Her vocals are breathtakingly raw yet cautiously controlled, as if she can feel the weight of her words in her chest, and she reveals that she used her original vocals on the final release to honour the authenticity of the recording. However, the song doesn’t leave its listener in darkness, instead revealing her inner strength as the verses unfold to showcase her search for closure and emotional healing.
“I’m definitely back to crying,” Tala reassures me. “I cry often – I cried yesterday – but usually it’s from positive emotions. I struggle to watch television or films and not cry at some point, even when I’m watching a live performance and they bring out a special guest, it can bring me to tears. I’m always crying about something.”
Tala first made waves in 2018 with her EP Starry Ache. The West London native’s honeyed vocals and spellbinding songwriting have seen her already rack up millions of streams and gain fans across the globe, as well as two co-signs by none other than Barack Obama. Following the release of her 2020 EP Girl Eats Sun, she took a break to recalibrate and spent extended time in Los Angeles with her chosen family, including a writing session in late 2021 where Tala penned her latest single.
18 months on from her last release, 2022’s ‘Stayed At The Party’, and she’s ready to return. “It’s an interesting feeling where I’m excited, but it also feels very surreal,” she says of putting out new music following a hiatus. “It feels like the right song to return with as it feels very me and quite foundation-level Hope Tala sound, which is a good way to start I think.”
Below, Tala shares how working with close friend Anoop, her chosen family in LA and the enduring influence of The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill inspired her single ‘I Can’t Even Cry’.
Working with friends
Tala admits that she seldom lets her personal and work lives crossover, so working with close friend and producer Anoop D’Souza on ‘I Can’t Even Cry’ was a new experience. “He and I had been friends prior to working together, which very rarely happens to me,” she starts. “Typically, if I become friends with people I work with, it happens very much after the fact – it never happens that I work with my friends, although I think that is what a lot of people do.”
However, it was her close relationship with her producer that lent itself to the meditative final track. “He suggested doing a session together and I was a bit nervous about it because if it went badly… we’d both be really disappointed if it didn’t go well.” After a few failed attempts to meet up, the two sat down together in December 2021 to pen the track. “I think in that first session we did, we were very aligned. With Anoop, because he knows me so well, he knows that I’m used to writing everything myself. He does his thing with the instrumentation, I do my thing with the lyrics – it was a very easy collaboration,” she smiles.
Striking a chord
“I’m very picky about chords,” she stresses. “Anoop showed me these chords that he’d come up with, and I immediately loved these chords.” Unlike previous releases, which have drawn from R&B, Latin, neo-soul and bossa nova influences, ‘I Can’t Even Cry’ is instrumentally stripped-down, relying on soft guitar strums and shimmering piano inflexions to accompany her intimate vocals.
“[Chords] are very gut lead for me and it’s something that I’m very, very decisive about,” she reveals. “I’ve always been quite a decisive and opinionated person, but in the last few years, I don’t know what it is about your early-mid 20s but I’ve become much more indecisive. However, chords are something that I’m still very Marmite about.”
Writing in Los Angeles
Tala explains that this song came towards the end of a year primarily spent writing in Los Angeles. “When I listen to ‘I Can’t Even Cry’ and other songs I’ve written in LA, it is reminiscent of my time spent there, which is really nice,” she shares.
Far from the Erewhon-obsessed, Lululemon-clad stereotype that’s become synonymous with the Californian city, Tala reflects on the creative community she has garnered in LA. “It’s basically my second home, I have an extensive and incredible community there that is my chosen family when I’m there,” she says. “There’s real magic in the place I think, and I think LA gets a really bad rap because people think it’s all West Hollywood and fitness-crazy people. No judgment toward those folks, but the LA that I inhabit when I’m there is very different. There are people who are from LA, whose families have been there for a long time who are some of the most incredible people ever. It contains multitudes and even though it’s seen as this very superficial place, it has some of the most genuine people I’ve met and it’s full of culture and counterculture.”
Lauryn Hill & Joni Mitchell
Despite the curated sound she’s crafted as Hope Tala, the musician reveals her own listening taste is eclectic. “I was listening to a lot of Lauryn Hill – I think The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill is my favourite album, and it’s an album that I come back to at least once a year,” she gushes. “I think I came to it at a very pivotal time in my life when I was around 14 and my mom showed it to me. It was the first time I was in music discovery mode as a young adult, but through that album, I then came to Erykah Badu and D’Angelo and the whole neo-soul genre.”
She continues, “I think what keeps me coming back is the stories in it that are both so universal and also specific to her. Sonically and thematically, it has its own universe to me. There’s something about it that feels so uncompromisingly authentic and special, and it just has a magic to it, and I feel safe when I listen to it. I’ll put on the intro and I’ll immediately be taken to this place of calm and stasis, I just love it.”
Tala says she was also listening to Amine’s 2021 album, TwoPointFive, as well as Clairo’s Sling and plenty of Joni Mitchell.
Acting natural
For the single’s artwork, Tala worked with photographer Erica Snyder. Shot in LA, the pair wandered its suburban streets to capture the raw emotion of the single. “It is quite Guerilla-style I suppose, just walking around and taking photos. [Erica] is amazing, I think she gives she gives a good amount of direction because I’m still not totally comfortable in front of the camera, I can find it quite difficult and unnatural,” she explains.
In the image, Tala is captured in a pensive portrait, her hand protectively wrapped around her shoulder while her gaze evades Schneider’s lens. “I get very worked up about things like artwork and visuals, because obviously, it’s all just supposed to feel like it supplements the music, and sometimes it’s quite hard to find that equilibrium or synergy between visuals and the music itself. I’m really happy with the artwork, it feels just right for the song.”
Listen to Hope Tala’s latest single ‘I Can’t Even Cry’ on Spotify and Apple Music now.
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