Sky Ferreira has returned with her first new single in over three years, ‘Don’t Forget’.
This smoky and soulful cut of ’80s-channeling new-wave sees Ferreira tap into a darker side of her artistry. In the second verse, she sings: “Honey, you can see that it’s a rotten world? / I don’t need you to save me, another drama unsung / I’ll catch your disease, it’s such a raw deal world / I don’t need to deceive you, I’m the real bad girl.”
Have a listen to ‘Don’t Forget’ below:
Ferreira co-wrote ‘Don’t Forget’ with New Zealand dream-pop artist Tamaryn Brown. In a new interview with Vulture, Ferreira explained that the song “wasn’t supposed to be apocalyptic, but in some ways it is”, with fire being a central motif (“Tears of fire in the sky / Makes me feel good to be alive”). She continued: “I did see fire, and I also saw a place between heaven and hell, that sort of vibe. But not in a biblical sense.
“I felt very stifled for a long time, and I still do. It’s not that I wanted to burn people’s houses on fire or something; it is a little more symbolic. It’s about being put in these situations for a long time. It’s a bit of freeing myself, but not in the most conventional way. Because I don’t feel free, necessarily.
“I’m not trying to throw everyone under the bus yet. Because that’s the thing: How do I say what I’ve been going through without having to become a victim to it or it becoming some narrative? Then my whole record becomes that. In my mind it’s like, ‘You don’t get to do that to me.’”
‘Don’t Forget’ comes three years after Ferreira’s last single, ‘Downhill Lullaby’, which landed in March 2019. Both tracks will appear on Ferreira’s long-awaited second album, ‘Masochism’ (though as she told Vulture, the album version of ‘Downhill Lullaby’ will have an alternate mix).
The follow-up to her 2013 debut, ‘Night Time, My Time’, was first scheduled for release in 2015, and has been pushed back multiple times since. Last October, she said a release date for the album had been confirmed, teasing its arrival this March. The following month, she asserted that ‘Masochism’ was “actually coming out” in 2022, and back in January, Ferreira’s mother re-confirmed that a March release was on the cards.
When the album wasn’t released in March, Ferreira told fans to hold off on their “wrath and death threats” until April. Though she’s yet to confirm a new release date or window, the singer told Vulture that she’s “100 per cent confident” in ‘Masochism’ being released sometime in 2022.
Since releasing ‘Downhill Lullaby’ in 2019, Ferreira has collaborated with Charli XCX on the song ‘Cross You Out’ (which featured on 2019’s ‘Charli’), and shared a previously unreleased cover of David Bowie’s ‘All The Madmen’ to mark what would’ve been Bowie’s 74th birthday.
