Philine Sonny - “Stranger in Your Living Room”
Photo by Nicolas Blanchadell
Bochum, Germany-based Philine Sonny returns to us with the latest single from her upcoming EP, “Stranger in Your Living Room,” a heartfelt and acoustically-driven journey through empathy.
This song opens with some exquisite lo-fi ambience, immediately allowing a distinct level of intimacy to wash over the listener. Acoustic guitar promptly joins, softly strummed as it makes its way above the delicate, distant synth pad. The first few moments of “Stranger in Your Living Room” are all you need to hear in order to be thankful that it exists.
Of course, the reason we pressed play in the first place was to catch an earful of Philine’s glorious vocal performance, a vibrant quality of hers that we learned to appreciate with her last release, “Take a While.” She has been blessed with a voice that does not require any digital manipulation, allowing the listener to experience the lyrics just as rawly as the emotions that inspired them.
With “Stranger in Your Living Room,” listeners are exposed to divine layers of swelling vocals across an otherwise stripped-back arrangement. The sounds ebb and flow like ghostly waves and it is impossible not to find yourself lost in its ocean of introspection. This wonderfully reflects the track’s subject matter of simply being present to absorb the vastness of another’s grief.
About the track, Philine offers: “One thing all of us are looking for is a place to belong… Where friends become family, where doors are always open. Now, for some of us, being close feels too close, being compassionate feels too pushy, and being there feels too much. ‘Stranger in Your Living Room’ is the prologue of a journey of recognizing false beliefs, relearning how to be human, and finding joy in being a friend.”
And if you find that streaming her music simply is not enough to satiate you, catch her on tour.
-HD