Reykjavík Grapevine - feb. 2020, Síða 23

Album
Stream ‘Ending Friendships’ on
Spotify.
‘Ending Friendships’ is a deeply per-
sonal, almost confessional album
from Laura Secord. In this edition
of Track By Track, songwriter Alison
McNeil explains the impetus behind
each song.
Embrace
This song is about how we inten-
tionally ignore the problems at the
start of a relationship in order to
feel close to other people. The warm
embrace of optimism. I like wrap-
ping a difficult thing in a cosy, fa-
miliar blanket and this song is a
blanket-y sort of thing.
I Thought, I Thought
When you’re a kid, everybody talks
about making friends, but no one
teaches you how to end a friend-
ship properly and so we all end up
ghosting each other in ways that
are sometimes more painful than
when it happens on Tinder or what-
ever.
Aeroplanes
I like love songs where you can’t tell
the gender of the person narrating
or the person they are talking to.
This one is about a robot who falls
in love and feels miserable and in-
stead of crying, light comes out of
their eyes, and people misunder-
stand and use the lights to search
for things they’ve lost.
Sweat
Another love song, this time with
someone who is very lost and really
bad for you. And how we love people
who are super bad for us when we
are feeling lost and super bad our-
selves. Super bad.
Rock Star Suicide
This is about our tendency to con-
flate mental illness with artistic
creativity. And the curation of our
culture through idolatry. I feel like I
avoided being the person I am today
for many years because I lost myself
in the idea of an unattainable ideal.
Crop Circles
Sometimes I wish I could just be
in a field at one with nature, but I
think there would always be a big
part of me that would feel like I
couldn’t believe my own nonsense.
That’s what I am singing about
here. Dancing in a field, trying not
to let me ruin it for myself.
All Night Long
I spent a lot of time with those al-
bums a few years ago when my kids
were the perfect age for them. I am
starting to really like this song, but
sometimes it feels like I’ve jumped
into an alternate reality when we
play it.
This Place Is The Answer To
A Question I’m Not Asking
This one is about transition from
one state to another, shifting your
relationship to the people around
you, switching your attention from
one message that society gives you
to another equally nonsensical
message.
Pornography For The
Socially Aware
There’s something very voyeuristic
about the way we curate our lives
and publish our “stories” and then
keep track of all these other peo-
ple to the point that we ignore the
people in front of us. The internet
isn’t going to visit you when you get
old. Sad.
We Woke Up
This one talks about how it feels
when a relationship ends. It feels
like everything that happened in
the relationship happened while
you were asleep and you’ve only
now woken up to reality. After a
while, reality shifts again and the
nightmare is what feels unreal.
Music 23The Reykjavík GrapevineIssue 02— 2020
TRACK BY TRACK
‘Endin! Friendships’
By Laura Secord
The band, not the chocolate
Words: Andie Fontaine Photo: Patrik Ontkovic
"I like love songs where
you can’t tell the gen-
der of the person nar-
rating."
gpv.is/music
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