Isabella Richardson: First Aid Kit
Isabella's debut EP is out now... let's take a listen!
Write down the name Isabella Richardson. She is currently in the midst of her first British tour, having settled on our shores from Australia. Tasmania, no less. If that journey was not enough of an achievement, it turns out she spent a few years in Los Angeles and was doing very well indeed. You can catch more of her life story and find out whether she prefers Vegemite or Marmite below.
Paul Dettmann
It helped slightly when I realised Issy lives in the same home county as yours truly, but only a little. I challenge you to spend half an hour on the phone with her and not end the call friends for life, quietly adding her to your list of "when phoned at 4am to request help burying a body, just say yes" friends.
One of the many reasons that I immediately decided to download Isabella's EP was that she is so self-effacing, apparently unaware of her effect on others. The artwork for the EP is vaguely autumnal and very British. Hard though it may be to fathom, she seems to prefer our decidedly meh climate to all the sunshine she grew up with.
Even better than all this, if improvement could be imagined, a cursory listen to the four songs gathered together as First Aid Kit reveals that every song features an explicit lyric. That is one of my favourite things about Australians, men and women both. They swear almost as often as me.
Waiting Room
We are only four words into the EP when we experience our first fuck. Yes, the F-word is the literal fourth word. She's really angry. I discovered that these four songs were written in quick succession, very close together, and they are mainly about the same ill-fated relationship.
I guess I fucked myself over with the last laugh
Cause I′ve been thinking bout you since and how I want you back
Heavy on the lump in my throat, a tough pill to swallow
That I thought of you as forever, but to you I was borrowed
We are not in the dentist's or doctor's waiting room here. At this season of her life, Isabella is feeling second best every time, at best. She is always someone else's Plan B. This is very difficult for me to imagine. Could it just be that she's drawn to that guy, the wrong 'un? I sense she would not really be happy with a doctor, dentist or accountant. She wants danger. Artists of all kinds crave it. Just not this much.
Body Count
This is the song that made me feel angry. I cannot be sure if the song refers to a single event, a series of events or a whole relationship. Isabella leaves just enough unsaid to introduce some doubt that adds to the mystery.
She seems at her darkest moment here. Something happened on her birthday, but it was not only that. There was a lot else that was dark. Just how dark, just what he did, is deliberately unclear. But this is a very good song indeed.
I′m not one to hold a grudge
I'm six feet deep in the hole you′ve dug
What you did on my birthday
I'll never live down
And I feel like a fucking fool for trying to get you to hear me out
It would be easy to walk away from a first listen to this EP feeling despondent. Anger is the over-riding emotion, at first listen. There is a lot else going on too, in particular a feeling that she might have lost this battle but is still very much in charge.
Runner Up
This song does what it says. It considers the unlikely scenario in which Issy is a runner up to a love rival. It seems that this is not unfamiliar territory. It has happened so often that she starts to question herself. If she is always second best to someone else, could it be her fault?
Go cry baby
Go figure it ain't me
Maybe I'm just hard to love
That's why I'm never good enough
But I don't want if, buts, or maybes
Is that too high of a shelf to reach?
Cause I know I'm not that hard to love
I'm just sick of always placing Runner Up
I'm afraid this is the kind of thing that can happen when you choose to hang around too long with men. They look a lot of fun from a distance but once you commit, they tend to... run a mile. This one dumped her after a twenty minute phone call. One wonders why it took him twenty minutes. Was he working up the courage? Making sure he was sure? Trying to suss her out, just in case there was any chance she was about to dump him first?
First Aid Kit
The title track arrives last. This is the moment when I look backwards and wonder if I have a favourite. The good news is that these songs are all very similar stylistically and are best interpreted as four parts of the same story. This one opens with Issy stuck on a ferris wheel at a carnival. She's going round in circles, never making progress. She is the other woman now, dating a man known to have a steady girlfriend. Could this be love? Do we need to ask?
I'm stuck on the merry go round at the fun fair
Reminding myself I′m a good person I just slipped up there
Cause I keep falling for these boys who show up like a man
Promising what ifs and future plans
It makes me think that this might be the first in the timeline... that he was still with someone else when they first met, but making empty promises about the long term. She's feeling the pressure from other friends, most of which are now coupled up and raising babies. Does this make someone lower their standards? That is the stereotype, certainly.
A Massive Future
If you get chance it is worth going off piste and finding some of Issy's other songs on your streaming service. She had a big success with her song, Galaxies, which appeared in a Disney Plus movie. Pin up Girls and Paper Crowns are also very strong.
The good news is that Isabella Richardson is highly self-aware. Whenever she is being gulled by a shark, we at least know that hindsight kicks in right away. She can always see the danger ahead, she always knows the outcome, even as she closes her eyes and dreams of an unexpected surprise.
It would be easy to say that this guy had trouble written right through him from the start, like Brighton rock. Less easy to admit that it was therefore all a total mistake. There must have been some highlights. And if there were not, at least she got this absolutely brilliant debut EP out of him. And even better, when he hears about it, he will know exactly whom it is all about.
Isabella Richardson is on Instagram and TikTok as well as on your favourite streaming service.
