Lolli Wren shares new single ‘are we alright?’

It would be easy to define Lolli Wren by the impressive statistics. A vocal range of more than four octaves. More than 375,000 YouTube subscribers. 51 million views. A reputation for replicating the techniques of hundreds of famous singers. But numbers do not quite explain what makes Wren interesting. The more revealing story is what happens when someone who has spent years studying voices decides to use her own as the primary instrument of an increasingly ambitious artistic world.

‘are we alright?’ marks another step in that transition. The latest release finds Wren confronting the strange emotional landscape of contemporary life, where constant access to information can coexist with an almost profound sense of disconnection. Its subject matter is heavy, but its musical vocabulary is expansive, combining avant-pop, experimental pop, progressive pop and art pop with a distinctly cinematic sensibility.

There is plenty of technical fireworks along the way. Wren wrote and performed every backing vocal herself, surrounding the lead performance with intricate layers that can feel choral, distorted and almost operatic. Eduardo Moreira provides the production and main instrumentation, while Barry O'Connell handles mixing and mastering. Together, they give Wren a canvas large enough for her voice to move from intimacy to theatrical excess without losing its emotional centre.

What makes the release particularly compelling, however, is that Wren is not interested in presenting herself as an expert on how to survive modern life. She is asking the same question as everyone else. Inspired partly by They Live and its vision of a hidden dystopia, ‘are we alright?’ turns paranoia into connection. It is a song for the moment when the screen goes dark and you realise you have spent hours absorbing the world's problems. Wren does not promise an answer. Instead, she offers the far more interesting possibility that admitting we are overwhelmed might be the first step towards finding each other again.