Be still my soul, a new Marina album is coming out.
Even after releasing her previous album only last year, Marina confirmed over the weekend that her fifth album is on its way.
Previously going by Marina and the Diamonds, you might remember some of her bops like How To Be A Heartbreaker and Primadonna from her 2012 album Electra Heart. Or, if you’re like some brave and weary souls out there, you’ll have seen a lot of her around Tumblr, lurking in the archives of soft grunge blogs.
Sure, maybe she gets a bit of an eye roll for some of her stuff, but she’s a fucking legend. Without her support and mentorship, Charli XCX would be nothing. You hear that gay Twitter?? N o t h i n g.
I’ve been listening to Marina since I was 13 and thought Electra Heart was the most brilliant concept for an album of all time. Songs that tell the story of a fictional character’s romance and break up, based around female archetypes of typical American culture? Artistic genius.
Even though Electra Heart was a character, we still saw Marina drawing on her own personal experience with identity loss, mental health, and heartbreak in her lyrics. The thematic switch that Froot brought showed us a whole new Marina, one I felt was more vulnerable and honest, especially with lyrics like:
“I found what I’d been looking for in myself
Found a life worth living for someone else
Never thought that I could be, I could be
Happy, happy.”
Before Love + Fear, Marina dropped “The Diamonds” while nailing down her own identity as an artist and a person, saying that she was so tied up in who she was as an artist, there wasn’t enough left of herself outside that. The album itself was more reflective and hymnal than her previous work, drawing on the work of psychologist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, who theorised that human are only capable of experiencing love and fear, with all positive emotions coming from love, and the negative coming from fear. And okay, look, Twitter really hates this album, but that’s just Twitter. Don’t trust ’em.
There is a new marina and the diamonds album! pic.twitter.com/sgcl1vT78K
— 🧜🏻a Trish out of water🧜🏾♀️ (@Trish_Argh) April 26, 2019
Marina was and continues to be one of the artists that I have been able to grow alongside. There’s something so powerful in sharing those experiences, especially as a teenager and young adult. Froot was released as I was beginning to tackle my own severe anxiety and depression, and seeing someone I cared so much about put what I was feeling in that exact moment into lyrics felt huge.
We have no idea what her fifth album will bring, but I’m hella excited to have it as the soundtrack while I look introspectively out the bus window. Now if you excuse me, I’m going to listen to Electra Heart and pretend I’m 14 again.
Image Sources: GIPHY, Instagram @marinadiamandis