I was not ready how emotionally heavy of a song that Cowards and Shadows would be. There is something about how Fiona Amaka takes you through the specific pangs of being ghosted that made me stop everything I was doing and just listen. Being there, we have all been there, haven’t we? The waiting, the wondering, the hoping, the being left in that dreadful place between hope and acceptance because a text never comes.
It is the voice of Amaka, which really gets me here There is this shaking helplessness in her performance that does not seem like an act, it seems like something that is lived. When she sings that there is no closure you can hear the anger and pain in every inflection. It is the sort of vocal performance that makes you think you are spying on someone speaking aloud their thoughts and not listening to a highly professional recording.
The guitar work also attracted my attention at the first instance There is this mellow, slightly coarse riff that establishes the perfect atmosphere of doubt- it is gorgeous, yet unstable, as much like the emotional space the song touches upon. Andy Zanini as producer has created something airy enough that all these complicated feelings can co-exist without overpowering the intimacy of Amaka as a storyteller.
The most interesting thing was learning that she had been playing this song at acoustic open mics and the audiences had immediately latched on to it. This is what explains how timely and necessary this song is. It is an age of ghosting where it has become an acceptable way to communicate and not communicate and Amaka has found a way to discuss the emotional consequences of this shift. The Bowie analogies are apt in this respect, but this is all hers. Cowards and Shadows never attempts to resolve anything, it just wallows in the pain and sometimes it is just what we need.
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