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Mar
11
1.19pm

PREMIERE: RUMOURS // New Single, ‘Neurosis’, Balances The Playing Field


One last push before the release of their second EP, If Only You Could Feel Something Too, and Melbourne alt-rockers Rumours have chosen well in their new single, Neurosis.

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A multifaceted track exploring a loss of oneself and the search to feel something again, Neurosis is theatrical, cinematic, and dramatic. Though it was written two years ago by Rumours frontman Jackson Bentley, when he was searching to break away from writing strictly heavy metal music and do something different, Neurosis sits comfortably in Rumours’ creative efforts today, thanks to its all-inclusive relatability and its art-rock sensibilities. “It worked its way into Rumours,” Bentley says, “and took on a life of its own.”


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There are negative connotations embedded in this song, ones that project regret and loss and doubt, all perceptions that are immensely important to Bentley. “I was living with a good friend who took me in, [and] my life was in just utter shambles,” he says of the Neurosis’ origins. “I had no job, no direction, living with this guy that was so full of life, very vibrant–I was the complete opposite. I was sitting on his couch one night and honestly, feeling like a total piece of shit.”

“I can remember the first sentence of the song, ‘I don’t want to be myself anymore’, just kind of flowed out and it just came to life from there on.”

“It wasn’t a suicidal thought or lyric, I just didn’t want to be me, I wanted to be this other person I was living with and embody what they were doing.”

When Bentley took the song to drummer Chris Lalic of Wagga Wagga metalcore outfit Windwaker–who ended up producing the end offering–he says it struck a chord with him, and everyone else involved in the process. “It [Neurosis] hit a soft spot for everyone,” says Bentley.

And when Rumours invited Windwaker vocalist Will King to contribute to the track, such was the resonance he felt to what Bentley had already established, Rumours gave him complete creative freedom with his contribution. “’Just write what you want to write,’ we said, ‘let it take hold of you and do its thing.’ It did and it worked out better than I could have imagined.”

This EP is just, from start to finish, is one big rollercoaster of sounds and genre and emotion. It’s taking all of our favourite genres, putting it into a blender, and turning it on high.
[ Jackson Bentley ]

Ultimately Neurosis is a song that expresses a sense of someone feeling defeated more than anything else, an observation of which Bentley is glad has been picked up on. “And in the chorus, where it’s more uplifting and asking, ‘what does it take to come alive, what does it take to feel like that?’ it’s sort of uplifting in a way that it’s also a melancholy song.”

“You get this uplifting chorus where you feel like you can pick yourself up again–and though you do feel defeated, you’re searching for the next thing to drag you out of the mud.”

When Bentley brought the idea to the rest of the band, asking them to consider its insertion into If Only You Could Feel Something Too, that universal understanding carried over, and Rumours banded together to put the complexities of Bentley’s experiences to a more subtle soundtrack. “They [Rumours] were aware I’d been doing this side project and knew the song existed. It happened naturally.”

“We need that last track to pave the way for the EP [and] we subconsciously all agreed. I don’t think there was ever a moment where there was this ultimatum. Just, ‘yeah, this song’s going on there. It’s happening.’”

And as for its place among the rest of the tracks on the If Only You Could Feel Something Too EP, if you’re judging a book by its cover, yes, it will fit in. “This EP is just, from start to finish, is one big rollercoaster of sounds and genre and emotion,” says Bentley. “It’s taking all of our favourite genres, putting it into a blender, and turning it on high.”

“It starts as more of a rocky EP and Neurosis is in the dead centre of it, coming from this pop-punk, rock sound–I wouldn’t even know what genre to call Neurosis. An EDM ballad, I guess. After that it takes a turn in the rest of the EP, getting heavier throughout.”

“It’s bipolar in a way. The whole EP is just so up and down, up and down, that Neurosis, I think, levels things out. Gives it a kind of a break to kind of just breath.”  


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