New Music: Flower Face – Valentine

Montreal goth-folk singer/songwriter Flower Face (Ruby McKinnon) takes an unconventional but deeply moving approach to affairs of the heart on Valentine.

Valentine will feature on upcoming LP Girl Prometheus – which McKinnon describes as her heartbreak album. The track itself has a wonderfully gothic and Gallic quality to it, doling out moments of pain and love, happiness and sadness, all in equal measure.

Though the vocals do evoke comparisons to folkish indie of Marika Hackman and Ethel Cain, the breathy delivery and dark pop mood here feels more reminiscent of Pomme or Jane Berkin at their most lovelorn. I dare you not to not shed even one tear to this song.

Says Flower Face, “[Valentine] is definitely the most miserable song on this record. When I was listening back to the rough mixes after we finished in the studio, I skipped it every time. It’s the one where I sort of rip my heart out of my chest and present it to the world on a plate, weak and bleeding and bare.”

“It’s still hard for me to listen to, because it puts me back in a place that I worked so hard to get out of. It’s humiliating in the way that only love and heartbreak can be. The other songs on this record all carry a certain amount of power and defiance, but this one is just so weepy.”

“It breaks the feeling down to its core: I love you so deeply, you hurt me so bad, I’m all out of poetry, you made me so sad. At a certain point you can only wrap so many beautiful words around a broken heart to make it more palatable: beneath that, there’s something so pathetic and desperate that needs to be let out.”

Girl Prometheus is set for release on the 1st of November via Nettwerk. Valentine is out now, can be downloaded on Bandcamp and is streaming everywhere including Apple Music, YouTube Music, and Spotify. Catch up with Flower Face on TikTok, Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook to learn more and the artist and Girl Prometheus.