VIDEO PREMIERE: Aaron James Dazzles with Layered Indie Folk on “Nobody Really Makes Love Anymore”

Photo credit: Gabrielle Duffie

Singer-songwriter Aaron James’s forthcoming album, Nobody Really Makes Love Anymore — out November 4th on Memphis-based indie label Unapologetic — is an artistic statement that feels like one long meaningful conversation about love, addressing the full spectrum sentimentality of the emotion. The 13-track album winds through actual short and thoughtful spoken musings on love along with songs of sadness, longing, pondering, anger, and, even, a few hopeful and positive tunes.

Nobody Really Makes Love Anymore is not about any particular relationship. It was written during a time where it felt virtually impossible to choose love, and it felt irresponsible to even search for it,” the Memphis-based indie folk artist says. “I feel that dedicating an album to this emotion is almost my retaliation to that guilty feeling of searching for love in what often feels like a loveless world. I hope these songs can inspire and encourage people to choose having human experiences and not give up on love for the comfort of simulation.”

Today Glide is excited to premiere the album’s eponymous lead single, “Nobody Really Makes Love Anymore.” Featuring a dazzling collection of sounds captured in nature and rich instrumental effects, it’s hard not to pick up on serious Sufjan Stevens vibes when you hear James’ hushed and delicate vocals alongside the shimmering indie folk. Musically, the song is meditative and melodic, with enchanting vocals, counter guitar melodies, and dynamic touches of electronic ambience that lend the song a feeling of grandeur. Lyrically, the song captures a post-heartbreak tale with a narrator who is reminiscing about a past love while searching for new love. This person slowly comes to the frightening conclusion that maybe things will never feel the way they did before with such a strong spiritual romantic connection. All of this culminates in a song that captures a sweeping beauty and pulls you into its aura.

Aaron James describes the inspiration and process behind the song:

There is zero part of me that is intrigued at the idea of romanticizing a melancholy lifestyle. But you also can’t help but feel a bit lost sometimes when you feel like the way you try to see the world, and the perspective you try to maintain, isn’t a vision that’s achieved by most everyone around you…and you’re in a place where you almost feel guilty, or out of line to pursue love during a time where so much needs mending in the world. Not to mention just the sheer difficulty of finding love and feeling magic when it feels like as a human race we’ve all gotten so far off course from what this all feels like it should be.

These are the thoughts that inspired this song. I don’t want people to be sad listening to it though, nor does it sound like a sad song. What I hope people feel inspired to do after listening is to think about what relationship they have with love, and what part love plays in their life. I hope in sparking that conversation and introspection, maybe I can somehow do my part to encourage carrying love in everything we all do…while at the same time….encouraging the listener to ponder why it’s become so difficult to feel it in the first place, and what that says about the world we’ve created for ourselves.

This song was written in early 2020, and was only ever supposed to be a stand-alone single. We got through most of the production in a home studio, Dirty Socks Studio in Memphis, TN. Then once the pandemic hit and that space was no longer accessible, we continued production in a shed-turned-studio space…which, not only was this months after initial production, but the new space also definitely influenced the sonic direction.

Then, it sat for over a year. And in that time, the decision was made to make an album, and an entire album was written and produced and the more I wrote and the more I lived, the more that stand-alone single slowly became a defining song and theme for that entire era of my life. And suddenly the message of this song was so much bigger and all-encompassing to me. This ended up being one of the last songs we finished in the spring of 2022, at OUTERSPACE., a studio built and owned by my team at UNAPOLOGETIC. in Memphis.

The goal, for me, was to try and make it sound as magical and beautiful as possible, to kind of paint the picture of someone who is fighting to feel those things in the real world, but singing about how he can’t anymore. I think the fact that this song was touched multiple times over a 2 year span, and was worked on in 3 very different recording spaces, all comes through in the track. I think it’s the biggest sounding song on the album, which is fitting because I feel like from a message standpoint, it encompasses the most.

WATCH:

Related Content

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recent Posts

New to Glide

Keep up-to-date with Glide

Twitter