THE 19-YEAR-OLD Norwegian songstress encourages people facing seemingly insurmountable odds
WHEN the whole world is crumbling around you, whom do you bank on to make sure you don’t get squished in its wake?
For singer-songwriter Aurora, who has just released her debut solo album, “All My Demons Greeting Me as a Friend,” no one should rely on others to help him or her get back on his/her feet.
Aurora writes music as a soothing balm to the “scars that we get in life.”
In “Conqueror,” the irresistible second cut from the aforementioned album, the 19-year-old Norwegian songstress encourages people facing seemingly insurmountable odds to stand strong: “Don’t look for someone else to save you,” she says. “Find the conqueror in yourself first. Be your own hero.”
AURORA: Be your own hero.
The catchy song, one of the 17 tracks in the album’s deluxe edition, rocks to a bouncy groove as Aurora imbues it with urgent desperation: “Broken me and broken them/ Oh, fantasy, take me over and break me/ I’ve been looking for the conqueror/ You don’t seem to come my way…/ But there’s no seduction, only destruction.”
The self-help ditty is by no means the album’s only notable song. The noirish “Lucky” and the ethereal “Black Water Lilies” are just as melodically enthralling.
For something more familiar, Aurora’s noirish retelling—and retooling—of Eden Ahbez’s “Nature Boy” is nothing short of spellbinding.