MORGAN HARPER-JONES - Joshua (Radio Date: 23-11-2023)

MORGAN HARPER-JONES

IL NUOVO SINGOLO
"JOSHUA"

L'ALBUM DI DEBUTTO
UP TO THE GLASS
IN USCITA IL 23 FEBBRAIO SU PLAY IT AGAIN SAM

Rochdale-born singer-songwriter Morgan Harper-Jones today releases her new single ‘Joshua’, the latest track following ‘Boombox’ to come from her debut album Up To The Glass which is set for release on February 23rd via Play It Again Sam. ‘Joshua’ showcases Morgan’s gorgeously expressive vocals that perfectly articulate her emotions in a way that provides an instant intimacy and connection.

“I love psychology a lot, trying to understand humans – including myself!” Morgan explains. “There’s often been a certain melody or lyric that comes out while I’m writing which can set me off really ugly crying. And then when I’ve played those songs at gigs so many times, I’ve had people say ‘Oh that one line really got me’ and I’m always like ‘what the hell?!’. You could never have known that one line really got me too. I feel like writing songs is like bottling little moments.”

Listen to ‘Joshua’ HERE

Morgan Harper-Jones is in the middle of a moment. Her music featured prominently in Netflix’s recent international #1 smash ‘Love At First Sight’, in the process catapulting Morgan into Shazam’s global Top 10 as well as seeing exponential growth across streaming and socials. Morgan is also becoming a live word of mouth sensation, selling out her two recent headline shows in both London and Manchester.

Up To The Glass is a delicate exploration of finding yourself in your twenties against a backdrop of love, self-acceptance and loss. Documenting those universally defining moments of young adulthood through the prism of Morgan’s own perspective, it explores deeply personal themes such as the passing of her grandparents, anxiously over-thinking every minor mistake, and yearning for a love that’s destined to remain unrequited. Morgan eventually found solace to those struggles through both therapy and the cathartic release of expressing herself through song. She’s an old soul with a significant appeal to her generation, her confessional dream-pop evoking influences which range from Maggie Rogers and Harry Styles, to Aldous Harding and St. Vincent, and back to Joni Mitchell and Paul Simon.

Morgan says, “The full spectrum of human emotion is here, and I hope listeners will recognise themselves and find comfort in these songs in some way. I feel like I’ve finally accepted that it’s okay to feel however I want to feel without apologising for that, as long as I try my best and don’t behave like an arsehole I’m all good, and this album is a record of getting to this place.”

The album’s intimacy comes from a streamlined approach to her creative process. Whereas her previous two EPs featured a wealth of collaborators, the majority of this record was initially written on acoustic guitar in her bedroom before being developed with Iain Archer. It’s an approach which heightened the personal touch that will make these songs speak to countless other people: a comforting “you’re not alone” in musical form. It’s a feeling that’s prevalent whether she’s addressing a glorious relationship that ultimately can’t last (‘Forever For Now’), exploring her regrets with wry humour (‘Main Character’, recently played by Mollie King on Radio 1) or delving deep into the devastation of grief (‘Lose A Tooth’). The result is a record that will surely elevate Morgan to the next level of an immensely promising career.

Morgan was raised by her grandparents, an upbringing which surely explains her possessing a maturity beyond her years. Raised to a soundtrack of their favourites proved the spark that ignited her own musical passions, eventually leading her to study songwriting at BIMM in Manchester before releasing two EPs, ‘Breathe’ and ‘While You Lay Sound Asleep’, that earned early airplay from Huw Stephens at Radio 1 and Lauren Laverne and Tom Robinson at 6 Music, plus acclaim from Clash and The Line of Best Fit. In the back of her mind, however, was the nagging feeling that she could’ve done something that more acutely captured who she was. That emotional minefield was complicated further by the death of her grandparents before therapy and a subsequently liberated approach to writing inspired this project.