Fresh from supporting Griff on her only Australian headline show at Sydney’s Metro Theatre earlier this month, celebrated and widely beloved Eora/Sydney R&B artist, musician, producer, engineer and music video director MILAN RING shares her latest single ‘Quicksand’, out now via Astral People Recordings.
Hallmarking her emergence into a playful and inquisitive new era, ‘Quicksand’ also acts as a tether to Milan’s previous incarnation, finding her addressing and reflecting on her younger self. With stacks of soulful, autotuned harmonies, shimmering, celestial-toned synth arps, a dusty beat and accents of Milan’s ever-nimble guitar work, she touches on past struggles of breaking through glass ceilings and imposter syndrome to presently wanting to be held in love by someone, “but also the polarity that ultimately you need to hold yourself,” she explains. ‘Quicksand’ is the sound of gracefully sinking into the compassion and the care that comes from accepting your own capacity to contain multitudes, sometimes harmonious, other times in contradiction, but always yourself.
Of the track, Milan elaborates: “Quicksand is about accepting yourself as you are and allowing love in. Having the safety and grounding of a love that allows you to take risks, go forward and break through the limitations and barriers that the world places on us, and that we internalise. The metaphor is that even when you appear to be climbing, the ladder is simultaneously sinking without that solid foundation”.
‘Quicksand’ follows up the previously released ‘Mangos’, a balmy and love-struck single that marked Milan’s return to new solo music since the release of her acclaimed 2021 debut LP I’m Feeling Hopeful. Co-produced by 18YOMAN, ‘Mangos’ landed as the fullest and most distilled expression of Milan Ring’s beguiling talents to date, seeing the multi-faceted artist weaving the Guzheng into her songwriting for the first time in a purposeful nod to her Chinese heritage. A homage to a summer love affair, crackling with humidity and longing, oozing a weightless, hazy giddiness, ‘Mangos’ earned praise and support from the likes of BBC Radio 1’s Jack Saunders, COLORS, NME, ACCLAIM, Wonderland Magazine, Northern Transmissions and many more, alongside rotation adds in Australia from Double J, FBi Radio, 2SER and airplay across triple j and community radio stations around the country.
Check out the video for ‘Quicksand’ below…
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