Forgotten Garden are back with their new single “James”, a touching indie rock ballad that sound deeply personal and expansively striking at the same time. “James” is a slow-burning, whispering confession, the kind that sticks around long after love peaces out.
The song equates love to an actual heartbeat. Melodic guitars dance in and out of the speakers, a swirling synth blankets the song with atmosphere, and the result is like slipping into an alternate, yet vaguely familiar world. One of the more curious instrumental flourishes is with the hybrid harp part, harp, part piano, whose motifs and solos constrain the cut with a bitter-sweetness that adds some emotional heft to the tale being told.
At the center of “James” is the voice of Inês Rebelo, which is quite simply skin-crawling. There’s a brittleness in her voice, but also a calm resolve like she’s singing from the brink of memory, remembering not only the grief of losing someone but an unyielding ache from knowing that nothing was done to prevent it. Her singing undulates with ghostly beauty, cresting over the instrumentation without losing its human coarseness.
What sets “James” apart is its honesty. Forgotten Garden captures the sense of universal pain that comes with lost connection, but does so with a palette that is not cliché. It’s a song that behaves like a tide, drawing listeners in with its melancholy beauty and then leaving them adrift, reflecting. On “James,” Forgotten Garden is still cutting a path where indie rock and emotional storytelling collide. It is a song for anyone who has wrestled with regret, and for every person who knows the silence of words unsaid.