Photo Credit: Tatsiana Tribunalova
Offering another look at his upcoming album Extricate, critically acclaimed solo artist Mar Omin shares the beguiling and beautiful new single ‘When I’m Gone’.
Formally known as ‘Mar’, the amsterdam based solo artist has had an illustrious career to date, touring Europe and gaining acclaim from the likes of Complex, i-D, Acid Stag, Earmilk, Majestic Casual, Vice and BBC Radio 1xtra, Mar has built a feverish fanbase with a growing anticipation for new material.
The latest offering ‘When I’m Gone’ once again showcases Mar’s impeccable ear for soulful, heartfelt songwriting and subtle yet interesting, experimental production. Blending plucky synths soaked in warming reverbs, soft piano and shuffling beats under his delicate, breathy and effortlessly hypnotic vocal, Omin creates a stunning, melancholic soundscape packed with breathtaking subtleties and deceptively catchy melodies.
Speaking about the track, Omin shares: “‘When I’m Gone’ is about releasing my fear of being alone. I often write about leaving the past or people behind and going somewhere new. I guess I really have felt stuck most of my life. I often felt I couldn’t be “me” or explore what being “me” would feel, sound, and look like. That there was no time for it. I had to know who I was. What I wanted etc. (Maybe this says more about our society as a whole). Therefore I’ve made many decisions I didn’t feel comfortable with. As I express in the song: “I have sold myself a thousand times, to a cause that I didn’t believe”. The song starts with the realisation of my fear. I rather felt miserable doing what other people said than not knowing what to do and being alone. I break from that feeling in the prehook saying “Maybe someday I’ll have answers. All I know is: Don’t look for me When I’m Gone”. Trusting myself. Giving myself the power to not know. And to figure it out along the way as I leave everything behind. Alone but free.”
The forthcoming project is about Mar Omin’s discovery of how trapped he had been in negative self belief, toxic relationships and freeing himself from them. Hence the album title, Extricate, which means “to free (someone or something) from a constraint or difficulty.”
Mar Omin produced, composed, and wrote the album with help from guitarist Daniel Malet, singer Szjerdene (Bonobo / Lapalux), and cello and strings by Sander Molder (Red Bull Music Academy alumni). Mar set out to make an album of 10-songs that reflect his mental health journey over the past three years. In 2018, he began writing in a daily journal and discovered many things about his beliefs of the world, his relationships with himself and with others, and how he has accepted them as truth. It was a difficult year for him, but in hindsight one of his favourite years. He realised he had been, and still is, insecure about his capabilities as a human being, and therefore as an artist. He used his daily journals as inspiration for the themes, lyrics, and emotional soundscapes. He wanted to go emotionally deeper on, Extricate. He has released several smaller projects such as EP’s and singles before; creating an album was a new challenge for him. With this forthcoming collection of songs, as an artist he shows the audience that he is capable of creating a solid body of work that he can tour with.
Raised on a houseboat, surrounded by live music from a young age, rhythm and tone flows through Mar’s blood. Inspired by quiet introspective reflection, his forthcoming self-produced debut album, Extricate, is nothing but therapeutic. Sensitive, emotionally, intelligent, progressive, and ambitious, each track the composer and singer pen expresses a complex universe of feelings and thoughts, delivered with a low-key, simple kind of clarity. Reaching soul-deep, communicating fragility and vulnerability, channelled through love and honesty, he is a true timeless vocalist and poet.