The five songs home in on the pair’s early twenties, with Hollan’s lead single ‘Water’ setting the tone. “When I was 19 turning 20 I spent three months in a small town in Germany learning the language and traveling a bit,” Manotti explains. “I wrote ‘Water’ a week after I returned home to Pennsylvania and spent the following many months in a bad depression that sprung from feeling like I had lost my identity somewhere between cultures, and maybe even on the plane ride home.”

The song is fully immersed in this mindset. A reflection in the aftermath of something important, snatching at the ghosts of what was left behind. As though to focus fully on those times might allow them to return, just as a dream might visit upon closing your eyes. The signature intimacy and sincerity of Hollan’s work comes to the fore, anchoring by acoustic guitar and floated on lush textures. “‘Water’ is a song that vividly traces the memories from which I felt most myself in my lifetime,” Manotti continues. “It was a song written in hopes to bring me back myself, and in turn, I hope it does the same for you.”

I went weightless
Into the water last summer
Baptized in youth
The ocean ’round my waist
I have always been this way
I was always meant to
I’ve always had these thoughts
I’ve always told them not
Not to you
But I had something to offer
When I went weightless
Into the water

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