Song: If I can’t love you anymore (feat. Joshua Grimmie)
Written By: Julia Volkova, Lilly Stuart
Produced by: Oliver Sykes, Julia Volkova and mISTER_b (Drake Anton Zaslavsky)
Genre: Electronic rock, Ambient, Alternative Metal
Length: 4:03
Release date: December 25th, 2020
Record Label: Studio 60
The Russian born rock singer Julia Volkova had been a member of ElectroDeath for 4 years when she decided to leave the group to focus on her solo career in 2012. Departing from the electronic music, which Julia was known for in her days with ElectroDeath, she has made her way into the rock and roll world, with her debut record “All you want to know about me”, ever since her debut Volkova has stablished herself as a reference in rock music with three other rock albums, two being released as a soloist, “Haunted” in 2013 and the most recent one “In the dead of the night” in 2015, she has also ventured herself alongside Alex Simms in a project called “Mutual Addiction” with an album called “This is a Wasteland” in 2014. With a curriculum of that scale, miss Volkova has traveled the world in a series of concerts in 2016 to promote “In the dead of the night”. In 2017 Volkova has decided to take a break from music business, she had traveled to her home country and has been living there for 2 years when she had finally decided to comeback to her L.A. home in 2019. Back to the stated, Volkova began writing and composing new music again, but any plans of releasing new material were scrapped due to the pandemic situation the world had been to since the beginning of 2020.
In September of 2020, Volkova had resumed her work on new music again. “If I can’t love you anymore” is a single recorded in November, at the same time Joshua Grimmie, who’s featuring in the track, was committed to the production of his second studio album GOLDENHEART. Due to the Covid-10 pandemic the work was done remotely.
The track was written by Julia Volkova and her longtime partner Lilly Stuart, who’s been credited as a songwriter in many releases regarding the members of what used to be ElecteoDeath’s production and management team. The production on the track was taken by Julia herself and mISTER_b but it also has the additional production of Oliver Sykes, the English alternative metal singer-songwriter and producer who has met Julia during her worldwide tour of 2016 in one of the venues at the O2 arena in London.
Julia has invites Joshua Grimmie to be a featuring in the single after she had listened to “Tragic Kingdom”, a mister Grimmie’s single to promote his second studio album. She has complimented him for his songwriting and production skills in addition to also feeling related to the theme of the song which Grimmie has been talking about in his dark lyrics. The connection between the two singers grew up towards the end of 2020, when Volkova sent Grimmie the track she was working on, the American singer has accepted the invitation right away. The two singers have yet to meet in person, according to the management team behind this release, the event will be happening during the recording of the music video which is expected to be released anytime soon.
“If I can’t love you anymore” is being promoted as a solo single but rumors say that the track is going to be included on what it seems to be Volkova’s forth studio album expected to be released in 2021.
The artwork of the single uses a picture by Wolfgang Lettl, a German surrealistic painter who’s produced a series of pictures displaying women being burned. The picture used in the artwork is named “The Man who Puts Girls on Fire” and it was produced in 1967. The picture showcases a woman’s body lying in a couch completely naked, this same body is being half burned while it falls in a flower camp with two man wearing masks. The artwork is open to interpretation, but it captures the idea behind the lyrics of the single which is a review of what romantic love, woman portray and dominant men’s of modern society.
Song DescriptionThe haunting ballad combines elements of electronic and atmospheric sounds with the attitude and style of rock and roll vocals. In the course of 4 minutes and 3 seconds the track progresses slowly to a climax that’s only reached at the very last chorus of it.
Volkova’s husky vocals sound breathy at the beginning of the track as it increases to a more guttural sound towards the choruses of the song. Grimmie’s vocal received a distorted effect during his verse while it became cleaner and louder during his chorus performance. The combination of both singer’s voices only appears at the very end of the track with Julia serving as a backing vocalist performing the guttural sounds behind Grimmie’s incredible high tones.
Melodically, the track is predominantly piano and ambient sounds, but throughout its length there are several additional electronic riffs and programming drums. Those elements make the track sound unique and different, but not loosing the haunting and depressive intonation of each note that has being sung by both performers.
Lyrically the alternative metal ballad takes a new approach on Romeu and Juliet’s tragic love story. Volkova plays the part of Juliet while Grimmie is Romeu in the narrative of the track. Instead of focusing literally on the Shakespearean story, the idea behind the lyrics is to work as an analysis and sometimes a critic to what it seems to be the romantic love displayed by moderns society and Christian religion today.
The female character in the track is portrait as a witch, a sinner, who’s crime was to fall in love with a married man, a life that she was forbidden due to her Christian’s beliefs of not being pure (a virgin) anymore, so she portrays herself as a person who needs to be condemned by her vile actions.
The male character in the track takes the responsibility of also falling in love for that other woman, but instead of being placed as a sinner, he sees himself as a man who’s being tempted to sin, the reference is Adam and Eve’s biblical storyline where the man is punished because of the woman’s act.
The Christianity references used in the track is linked to the ideal creation of what it seems to be a perfect family in our modern society, Volkova has declared that: “Everybody wants to love and to build a family, but the main question is what does it take to have the family that our society wants us to have?, Can’t we love freely? In my point of view, this romantic love that’s often sold as a model to be followed , has only caused to humanity a great deal of depression and anxiety, the sensation of having someone else belonging to you, it’s undeniably inhuman, we’re born to love freely.”
LyricsJulia VolkovaJoshua GrimmieBoth(Ooh-ooh-ooh)
(Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh)
(Ooh-ooh-ooh)
(Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh)
In the dead of the night, I have confessed my sins
The purity that I beheld before I saw what this seems
You’re entwined in a reality from which I was forbidden
For I lost my innocence long before I had the conscience
Fate inclines me to make the same mistake again
Chorus
And I’m here
turning over in the ashes of my own profane past
Where every bit
Of my burnt soul attaints and blinds my eyes
I can’t scape, ‘cause what I have made
Exposed my sinful soul to inquisitors
So let me burn at the stake one more time
If I can’t love you anymoreTasting the forbidden fruit, I grant myself to you
In the search for happiness, I condemned those who loved me too
You bewitched me like a dark night clouding my mind
Taking me over the edge holding my last breath
With your seductive solitude I set out to love you
Chorus
And now, I’m here
brooding over this sin that my heart insists on saying I didn't commit
And every night
In my restless dreams, there you are tormenting my sanity
I can’t scape, what I have made
Exposed my sinful soul and I’m with the blame
So let me burn at the stake in your place
If I can’t love you anymore
If I can’t love you anymoreI will bear this guilt until the end of time
This love won’t let me rest my mindI'll wander aimlessly until the end
This love will be my last breathChorus
And now, we’re here
as souls remaining from a life that never happened
And every fragment
of our act condemns us to die forever
We can’t scape, what we have made
Caused so much hurt and left us with the blame
We are left to burn at the stake
If I can’t love you anymore (I can’t love you anymore)
If I can’t love you anymore (I can’t love you anymore)
If I can’t love you anymore
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