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It’s been 3 and a half years since we discovered the French duo Willo. Hailing from the mountains that separate France and Spain, the Pyrenees, Cécile and Olivier enchant the world with their elaborate folk melodies and warm vocal harmonies.
Listening to a Willo song is always pretty much the same experience: close your eyes, and feel like you’re wrapped in cotton. A wave of sweetness and warmth immediately washes over you. And you can feel this warm energy in their latest single “Closer,” released on November 29th.
The duo has accustomed us to strong emotions and shivers by painting a picture right before our eyes, just with their lyrics. This time, it’s a journey into the sometimes ambiguous feelings we can experience after a breakup. We try to move on hard… Because we know that the slightest scent, the smallest song, in short, the slightest memory that can remind us of the lost person can make us crack and go back to them, even if we know it won’t work anymore.
And all of this is summed up in the chorus: “Don’t come closer […] I wouldn’t be able to see you as a stranger.” Believe me, I’ve listened to thousands of songs about breakups, and this line and the way it’s written really touched me with its originality and sincerity. It’s kind of an involuntary but assumed admission of weakness. What human nature has to offer us at its most authentic. Because nobody is perfect.
This song, which is truly close to perfection (I won’t say it’s reached it because artists should always leave room for improvement), has undergone many different versions before becoming the masterpiece it is today, as they explained to us:
“This song has been around us for almost ten years now. The lyrics changed pretty much every two years. A first, never-released version of ‘Closer’ hides itself on a hard drive somewhere in Willo’s studio.“
The band has evolved the lyrics over the years, and the song has ended up growing with them, to the point of reaching a point of maturity, where the comparison between love and addiction becomes the skeleton of the writing.
In terms of production, in “Closer,” Willo perfectly blends the instruments, the acoustic guitar, the piano… and then those truly incredible percussions, both discreet and so essential to the construction of the song. It’s as if each beat was like a hammer blow driving the nail of regret a little deeper into the healing scar. I’ve rarely heard percussions so well done and so moving.
You’ll notice them most at the very end of the track, coupled with an enchanting piano, on an outro that leaves us with a feeling of floating and unanswered questions: “And now, what do we do with this relationship?”
