BEVERLEE Shares New Single & Video 'White Piano'

LA-based pop songwriter and producer, BEVERLEE, has set the date for when debut album, Purple Violin, and announces the release for May 28, 2021. Today, she also shares her second single from the forthcoming LP, "White Piano," along with a music video directed by Raechel Zarzynski. "White Piano" was inspired by BEVERLEE's breakup right before quarantine.

She explains, "My girlfriend and I broke up right before quarantine, and I was completely destroyed. I would stay up all night writing emails I'd never send that swung between rage and regret or shame, and I would always stop at 5 am or so and be like 'she won't read this, she doesn't want to read this." The harsh realization of her loved one not wanting her anymore sent BEVERLEE on an obsessive journey during quarantine to find a perfect white piano, as she scoured Craiglist and various used piano sites.

BEVERLEE continues, "The line about going into a warehouse with a stranger and my fingers covered in paint after touching the piano that he had very obviously just painted white moments before... that actually happened. When I was in my car, I started singing that 50s melody 'my baby, she don't wanna hear, she don't wanna hear from me no more' and it evolved or devolved from there. And I never ended up attaining this ideal white piano, I got a natural wood Yamaha U1 upright that is kinda rough and raw but sounds warm and is absolutely perfect for me."

The production and songwriting of cinematic and cold industrial sounds beneath a mournful melody and retro harmonies take the listener on BEVERLEE's frustrated journey, which ends with her body inside a piano. The video doesn't pick up on this direct imagery, but it does have a film-like quality, in the sense that the video's leading lady, Caroline Blaike, who starred in the "6X" music video -- the project's debut single that's a whimsical love letter to all manners of relationships during Covid -- is back again as BEVERLEE's Alicia Silverstone/Liv Tyler. Blaike is an ASL interpreter (Billie Eilish) and dancer (Jumbo's Clown Room).

In the video, Blaike wakes on a lawn, strips and panics in the bath, and an endless time loop ensues. She continuously jolts up from napping or gasps in the tub, realizing that her lover doesn't want her anymore. By the end, she has embraced the absurdity of being alone, making snow angels in a pile of clothing on the bed, while adorned in a ball gown and flower crown. BEVERLEE says, "It oddly ended up being a quarantine video in that sense too, because she is never escaping her own insanity, and the objects around her take on a fantastical nature to the janky industrial beat."

Enlisting the help of director Raechel Zarzynski to make the video for "White Piano," BEVERLEE met with her on Zoom, in true Covid-networking fashion. She explains, "I had seen her queer short film Sinked Up and I knew she understood that feeling of total helplessness and shame. We're both emo water signs, so it was like let's make something scary and dreamy!" BEVERLEE and Zarzynski looked to late sixties Czech new wave movies like "Daisies" for inspiration on the aesthetic and jagged editing style. This aligned perfectly with the overall goals and scope of the project at large.

BEVERLEE is a queer woman, a person who is doing generational healing, and a soul who seeks resistance in the form of joy and sexual freedom -- an opportunity her late cousin, Beverlee Jacobson, no longer has, as her life was stolen in the 1970s at the hand of her Hells Angels boyfriend. The impact murder has on a family is too complicated and painful for words and has caused much shame and trauma in her family, and BEVERLEE seeks to pay tribute with fierce love and unapologetic living. The project is about unheard voices and is a celebration of queer, left-of-center pop. This release is a moment of Diamond stepping into her power as a performer, songwriter and producer in the form of BEVERLEE, as well as a celebration of her rebirth as a gay woman in Los Angeles.

The hitmaker, formerly known as Abby Diamond, produced most of the forthcoming album, co-produced a few songs with Matt Mariano film composer who did Grey's Anatomy, Raising Hope and Bri Holland, vocal arranger for Trolls, Madagascar and numerous pop albums. Mostly having been behind the scenes as a songwriter, Abby Diamond's music is constantly in the public sphere and enjoyed by millions, often having music in film/TV ads and even touring with major acts like Barenaked Ladies. In 2016, she wrote the hit dance song, "Places," by Xenia Ghali. Recently, her work with Shea Diamond, a Black trans artist with whom Diamond wrote "American Pie," picked up massive recognition as Joe Biden even danced with her to it at the White House. She also worked on the Son Little (Anti) record Aloha, co-writing the song "about her. again," which has had placements on various hit shows. She prides herself in working with queer artists and supporting other women, like BIIANCO, Janelle Kroll and vöx.

Watch the video for "White Piano" here:

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