Fenne Lily is back. The Brooklyn-via-UK singer-songwriter entranced many indie-folk fans with 2023's Big Picture, and she's getting ready to do it again with Win Win this fall. The poignant lead single "Uh Huh" is out today.
"Writing in the third person was the key here — it felt like I was summing up the life of someone close to me but separate," Lily explains, continuing:
It tracks the period after the end of a relationship, when you’re ready to love someone again but feeling residual pain from the time before. Every breakup has felt like it’ll hurt forever but it’s always led me to something different, often better, never nothing. "If I only have this one life it should take the shape I’m in" — I was in a good place when I wrote Uh Huh and writing this line particularly proved that to me. I was shocked that I meant it, how much had changed in the space of a few months.
"You’ll never want to doubt it but the last time you have it it won’t kill you" — this pretty much sums it up, the fact that you’ll remember the pain, you’ll always want to believe that the love you have will last, and if it doesn’t there’ll be another.
This one changed a lot from writing to recording. I knew it had to have a solid groove to it, sound strong and sure of itself, and it took a couple of different band configurations to get there (James on drums was a missing ingredient.) It felt from the start like it leaned more country than other songs I’ve written, though, and that didn’t change. Like I’d absorbed some of the America I live in now. British country music…
Win Win was written and recorded over the course of 18 months, with most of it recorded live and partially to tape. Hear "Uh Huh" below.
TRACKLIST:
01 "Uh Huh"
02 "Room To Room"
03 "Sleeping"
04 "Waterslide"
05 "Stranger Things"
06 "Thank You Sorry"
07 "Franz"
08 "Two Ways"
09 "Cupboard Song"
10 "In Life And On Planes"
Win Win is out 10/23 via Nettwerk. Pre-order it here.
