By now the legend of SIA is pretty much apparent to us. She is the powerhouse songwriter behind successful hit numbers of many an artist including the likes of Beyonce and Rihanna. And, now she is all set to pay a tribute to her songwriter past in her new concept album “This is Acting”. Yes, the name couldn’t be more appropriate because this album will be featuring the songs she had originally written for other artist but then, fate had it otherwise and they landed back to the lap of their creator! Interesting indeed, right?
I cannot deny that this piece of news has had me excited ever since I heard of it. SIA is probably one of the few artists with a smashing vocal range and a unique singing style who also happens to be extremely masterful as a songwriter. Her songwriting prowess is just too perfect for the powerhouse style pop music she produces. And, if there’s anything about her we’ve learnt from “Chandelier” and “Elastic Heart”, it’s that her range defying voice is going to be shaking up the pop scene for a long time. However, I cannot help but try to imagine what could become of those songs had they landed up being brought to life by other extremely talented singers like Adele, for example. That could have very well have been a possibility as SIA says in a recent interview about her newly release song “Alive”.
Interestingly, Alive was originally supposed to go to Rihanna or Adele, as both of them had been interested in it. Here’s what she said in her beats 1 interview - “What’s funny is that I wrote it and gave it to Rihanna and I had seller’s remorse because I was attached to it, I regretted it. Then she gave it back to me and I was relieved. Then Adele heard it and asked if she could have it. I thought ‘Do I like it, or do I like a million dollars?’ She cut it and it was so amazing. I’m a huge fan of her voice.” But, eventually it did come back to SIA and she finally recorded it in her voice. I’m totally on page with her on the seller’s remorse part. As a writer I had once taken up an extremely lucrative ghostwriting assignment and it’s the worst feeling to see your work grow and belong to a different person. I am more than happy for SIA for getting to sketch her song her way.
Alive as a song might lack the angst and the punch of her previous tracks and I can almost hear it taking shape as an Adele song. But, that might be my brain playing tricks on me. I would like to hear Adele’s version sometime in future though, maybe a cover, for I believe Adele’s maturity can provide the song a different dimension and I’m game to try lending an ear to that. As for a whole album full of songs that didn’t make the cut with other artists, it does sound risky-business. However, considering the creative monster that SIA is I am more than willing to give it a fair chance to impress me. I do wish, though, that she has more interesting back-stories of the songs in store for us.
