The latest single from NYC-based songwriter Poise makes offering yourself to someone sound like a curse and a prayer. A dark synth comes into focus slowly within the first 30 seconds of “Give,” growing louder as Lucie Murphy sings: “Please be kind / All over, I am tender.” Angelic coos cushion her heaven-aimed pitch. Poise sounds grateful for this rare intimacy (“I’m so comfortable when I’m with him / And I know, Doesn’t happen often”), but it’s unclear if she’s receiving the equivalent of what she’s giving. She sings of an infinite cornucopia of love, but Murphy’s human limits are bound to impose themselves. “It’s about the ways in which I lose myself in my relationships,” Murphy explains. “If I feel close to someone, I cling to them, for better or for worse.”
The single is accompanied by a Twin Peaks–like visualizer wherein Poise is consumed by orange light in a room of mirrors. It’s a surreal image that might also lend to the track’s underlying unease. Toward the end, drums begin to bubble over the dark electronic soundscape and piano begins to twinkle through as she repeats, in a breathy high pitch for over a minute: “I give and I give and I give.” Recalling BANKS or Tei Shi, "Give" is shadowy synth-pop at its purest.
“I learned to trust my instincts as a producer while arranging ‘Give,’” Poise shares. “It’s only the second song I’ve completed in the pop sphere; I mapped out the structure entirely on my own in Garageband before bringing it to my co-producer, Sam Skinner. Sam is a very discerning listener—his enthusiasm for the song instilled a lot of confidence in me. We replaced some of the Garageband sounds with higher-quality samples and acoustic instruments, but ended up keeping a lot of the built-in synth patches, too. My drummer, Theo Munger, really let loose in the outro. We’ve been playing music together since we were kids, yet he still manages to exhibit parts of his musicality I’ve not yet witnessed. His performance is raw and powerful. It still gives me chills when I hear it.”
The single comes from Poise’s forthcoming sophomore album Hell or High Water that’s out October 4. The follow-up to 2021’s Vestiges is about “the ever changing shape of grief” and features Half Waif and Toledo.
