Samantha Urbani is back with her new single “More Than a Feeling”, a groovy alt-pop track that delves into the feelings of a one sided romance. Marking the first single from her forthcoming album, the track was co-written, recorded, and produced with Nick Weiss (aka Nightfeelings), opens with grimy synths and pure whistling (courtesy of Molly Lewis). Listen to it now below.
Samantha said of the song, “I’m calling someone out for not showing up for me, but also calling myself out for sticking around for that, enabling it by engaging with it, and saying ‘I can see what you’re communicating to me by not being here.’ And the hardest part is that I’ve waited so long to accept it that I can’t even address it anymore and they stopped caring a long time ago. It’s saying goodbye to someone who’s not even there.”
The accompanying music video, which Samantha directed herself, explores the liminality of unrequited love. She wanders through the neon wasteland of Los Angeles’ Hollywood Boulevard before embarking on a motorcycle ride with a helmeted man, never truly connecting with her masked driver or finding a place to settle down.
Samantha said of the video, “My references for this video are pretty succinct. Toni Braxton’s“Unbreak My Heart” and Celine Dion “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now” – both 90s vids that had a huge impact on me,with boyfriends who die in motorcycle crashes.The video is a rescue fantasy – motorcycle guy is a modern day knight in shining armor – heroic but inhuman, totally protected with walls that cannot be broken thru.So,it’s the antagonist who I can’t seem to reach even when they’re right in front of me.A tragic figure of toxic masculine fragility/emotional unavailability. All of the motorcycle guy sequences are meant to be questioned whether it’s real or imagined. Like I’m waiting to be rescued and fantasizing knowing I’m on my own.”
Samantha fell into the mainstream in the early 20-teens when she was the creator and frontwoman of Brooklyn based DIY band Friends and collaborated with Blood Orange, but on “More Than a Feeling” she strikes out on her own. Its juxtaposition perfectly captures Samantha’s longing for connection with an uninterested partner, complete with the nostalgia of lost love in new-wave tinged production, utilizing steady percussion and a moody bass as the foundation. She goes full pop for the track’s utterly shoutable chorus, letting her ethereal, husky vocals take center stage.