Twenty-year-old Winnipeg singer/songwriter Taylor Janzen takes us on a journey of self-discovery in new single "Devotion" out now on Glassnote Music. Produced by Luke Niccoli (Miya Folick, Joji) and mixed by Neal Avron (Brandi Carlile, Bleachers, Twenty One Pilots), the song explores the balance between being able to love someone or something and still have self-identity.
"Devotion" is a follow up to singles "What I Do" and "I Feel A Darkness" released earlier this year, which have been streamed over 3 million times and featured on many playlists including Spotify's New Music Friday, The New Alt, Fierce Femmes, Your Office Stereo, Apple Music New Music Daily, Alt Pop, Alt CTRL, Amazon Weekly One Artist, Brand New Music, POP Lab, YouTube Music Pop Before It Breaks and Indie Hot List.
"I am the type of person who is completely unable to love anything or anyone casually. I've always been that way," said Taylor Janzen. "Eventually I realized that while loving wholeheartedly isn't a bad quality, I have a tendency to search for things to throw my whole identity into, like I'm always searching for things to control me. Things to belong to. If you're being controlled by someone or something else, you're less responsible for your own actions and feelings. I forget who I am and I create identities for myself based around the people and things I love. This song is about trying to find myself again."
Janzen first garnered praise from the likes of Lucy Dacus, Phoebe Bridgers and The New York Times with her debut EP, "Interpersonal", which was mastered by Greg Calbi (Julien Baker, Arcade Fire, Big Thief), and co-produced by Janzen. Last year, Janzen released her second EP "Shouting Matches" recorded for the first time with a full band and in a studio environment. With further praise from Exclaim!, NYLON, Paste, Noisey, i-D and more, Taylor kicked off the year as an Official Artist at SXSW where she performed at the Rolling Stone Emerging Artist Showcase and NPR featured her in their coveted Austin 100.
Growing up, Taylor wasn't encouraged to speak through her feelings, so turned to songwriting as an outlet. As a result, with each song we're granted an intimate and almost painstakingly brazen glimpse into the most heart wrenching pages of her diary. She writes candidly, touching on the topics of mental health and emotional abuse, noting that, "the music that I write is very honest, so it speaks for itself." Her talent is not lost on her audience with Music Week most recently describing her work as "unstoppable, brilliant songwriting."
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