Fresh Folk-Pop. - Matthew Pinder: Give Me Some Time

Bahamian singer-songwriter Matthew Pinder sings from his own experiences, and is never afraid to use the power of honesty and emotion to illuminate a simple truth. Seeking for answers and a way to slow the world down, if only for a moment, we explore the vast range of human connections that lie at the heart of both life and music.

Our spotlight track is Break My Heart and Let Me Go, a heartfelt duet that Pinder sings with the talented Molly Bush. What feels special about this, beyond the gorgeous chemistry between lead vocals, is the power of the catharsis itself: as appropriate as it is as a symbol for the determinist nature of love, it also doubles as a shorthand for life - which does little else but break our hearts and let us go.

Because half of anything isn’t enough
Because I’ve had the real thing

We can learn to live with the hills and the valleys, as long as we have something that inspires us. In a world full of externalities, we hang on to what feels personal, and what makes us feel unique. And we keep a special place in our hearts for the one person we are willing to share everything with.

Because the secret of life is that there is no secret; there is just right now, this song, this chance, this day. Because we are all going to end up lost, at some point; we are all going to fade away. Because we don’t know who we really are until it is almost too late. This is how we know: you will end up broken. The only question will be - was it beautiful?

Just before the end, was it beautiful?

You've been rumbling down the road
With feet like wind with your heart on hold

The message here is that we get to build a life for ourselves with the decisions that we make. From the relationships, to the personal priorities, and the detours of serendipity, we find exactly what we search for - and we find perfection to be as ethereal as happiness itself: always relative, occasionally in view, and never quite palpable.

Golden Hour, the lead single from Give Me Some Time, is a spacious and poignant track that hints at a simple downtempo groove with long chords on the piano and a heartbeat thump. Adding layers of strings, vocal harmony, and ear-candy from the electric guitar, over the course of the arrangement the mix slowly transforms into that of a gentle chamber-pop ballad. Drawing on the imagery of that time just before sunset, we find parallels between the world and the seasons of our own character.

But as usual, we finish any personal achievement with the urge to share it with someone - whether it is the end of a day, or a thought, we tie it to ourselves with the thread of another, when we are lucky enough to have them.

There were ashes on my lips from the words you breathed

The best magic is chemistry with the one who holds the key to your heart, and those moments of true solidarity can change someone forever.

You're in every song I hear and every song I write

Matthew Pinder is a Bahamian Singer-Songwriter from Nassau. His new release Give Me Some Time is a complex mix of roots, Americana, and soaring melody, and is available now. His expressive lead vocal splits the distance between an airy falsetto like James Vincent McMorrow and the soft grittiness of Noah Gundersen.

Break My Heart and Let Me Go is featured on our Rainy Day playlist.