OH DELIA
[Kiah Gossner - Producer & Engineer]
“I write music for the lonely, the heartbroken, the lost and the hopeful.
For the people who need to have their stories told.”
South Australian singer/songwriter Oh Deliah writes sweet, melodic indie folk with tender vocals and heart wrenching lyrics, accompanied by her warm, fuzzy electric guitar or sweet ukulele. Her debut EP These Old Dreams is set for release on May 18, 2019.
Oh Deliah, aka Becky Althorp, grew up in the Adelaide Hills listening to her parents’ vinyl collection. The sounds of artists such as The Beatles, Crowded House, Fleetwood Mac and Simon & Garfunkel filled her house. As a teenager she began exploring more contemporary music, where she found herself immersed in the poetry and soundscapes of artists such as Laura Marling, Cat Power, Regina Spektor and Keaton Henson.
A daydreamer and self-described ‘quiet old-soul’, Oh Deliah loved poetry, nature and art as much as music, but almost as soon as she began learning guitar she found herself exploring new sounds and melodies and penning her own songs. She filled journal upon journal with phrases, poems and lyrics until eventually, armed with a handful of songs, she began gigging around Adelaide, popping up at The Grace Emily, Crown & Anchor and The Governor Hindmarsh.
Now in 2019, and with the help of funding from Carclew, Oh Deliah has just finished recording These Old Dreams. Produced by Kiah Gossner (Kaurna Cronin, Timberwolf, MANE), and featuring Oh Deliah on vocals and guitar, Kyrie Anderson on drums, Taasha Coates on keys and Kiah on bass, the EP features five tracks recording at Mixmasters Studios at the end of 2018.
Opening track and first single April Sun plays with that most familiar of subjects, the fleeting desire between two strangers. Dreamer Boy is about the singer’s frustration and disappointment in a lover, then following that theme, the melancholy Pitiful Ones speaks of the yearning and agony of being apart from a loved one. Fourth track Flower Girl reflects a girl’s desire to protect herself from future heartbreak, only to discover that she has only shielded her loved ones, not herself. Closing track Tear Stained Heartache is perhaps the most melancholic and menacing track on the EP. “It is about the darkness that engulfs your life after breaking away from a profound but ultimately destructive love,” Says Oh Deliah of the track, “and the loss of innocence that comes with that.”
Listen to Oh Deliah’s beautiful, raw and bittersweet EP here. “I’m interested in the raw vulnerability of people. It’s something that has always intrigued me”, says Oh Deliah, “I feel it’s my purpose to be authentic, and to make sense of some of the strangest and most wretched things in this world.”