The intricate balancing of sonic warmth and acoustic intimacy – an expression of longing and contemplation that rises with honesty and esteem, throughout a softly expanding, organic but impassioned audio arrangement…
New York-based songwriter and artist Inés Hall throws structural caution to the wind, with the poetic questioning and evolving melodic presence of both in bed.
Noting over 11k followers on TikTok alone, the vulnerability of Inés Hall’s music and songwriting approach is clearly connecting. The style inherently opposes the electronically soaked rise of AI production, and instead focuses on the gentle fingerpicking of an acoustic guitar, and these breathy weaves of vocal and synth-soaked ambiance.
In an instant these lyrics connect for their sense of both the deeply personal and the broadly accessible. It’s a conversation that’s unreal but possible – the sort that takes place in your own mind, as you dream of lying next to someone whose presence has overwhelmed and consumed your thoughts.
That honesty is relatable to most, but the intimacy of the writing here, the direct addressing, and the simple fingerstyle arrangement, all makes it feel like a genuine letter or whisper to a significant other.
“Are you thinking about the answers to the questions that you have in your head? Like where I’m going? What I’m doing? And who I’m spending my nights with?”
In reality, both in bed reflects upon our protagonist’s own experiences with a long-distance relationship and subsequent break up. The distance and the wondering what they’re doing now resounds with a clear humanity and heart, effectively appearing as if this song is a secret piece of someone’s inner soul, but one that naturally feels important and relevant to our own story.
That’s a rare balance to achieve in music, the authenticity combined with the musical and conceptual appeal. To then weave in the original structure, this constant melodic repetition followed by the single build up and resolve to the title sentiment, is to allow both in bed to emerge as a genuine, distinct, and memorable original folk song.
Slowly but surely the strings rain down, voices and layers of gentle intensity raise the pulse, and the concluding idea echoes through the space with quiet desperation and warmth.
Find Inés Hall on TikTok & Instagram.
