It’s a beautiful thing to collide with an artist that holds conviction and authenticity when approaching their craft.
For marigolden this is upheld by her unyielding commitment to longevity, the core message of her debut EP – Long Game.
With the first single from the forthcoming debut out now, marigolden’s latest track Great Ocean Road contemplates the undulating and journeying coastal thoroughfare as a metaphor for the human condition.
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It’s mixed with a snappy chord progression expressed through driving guitar tones, overlaid with marigolden’s considered lyricism and unique vocal melody. Exploring the themes of identity and externalised societal pressure, the song elicits an insatiable listening experience.
Great Ocean Road sets the tone for the remaining tracks on Long Game, five songs of waviness that ebb and flow between delicacy and dynamic exuberance.
To honour her pursuit of genuine connection and slowing down as a departure from the noise of the internet, we spoke over coffee. Whilst dappled mid-morning sunlight fed into the ambience of the northern suburbs of Naarm/Melbourne.
marigolden is trialing this EP release by not engaging with social media herself, putting the underlying message of Long Game to the test. In doing so, marigolden challenges the often transient and fleeting expression of engaging with social media in our current age.
However, marigolden won’t be completely void of a presence from selected social media platforms during the release. She has recruited a friend to login for her and post on her behalf around once a month.
This approach centres around an emphasis on real people, an active audience and the songs and stories themselves, drawing light on how we related to music pre-internet.
We sauntered through the complexities that come with the modern dilemma of artistry in the age of social media, our conversation remaining colourful and fruiting an entanglement of many threads.
And yet it became apparent that this story is one of prioritising wellbeing and holding conviction as an embodied truth. Allowing for marigolden to experience a prolonged career in music, rather than being subjected to burnout in many forms at the hands of social media.
It doesn’t come without awareness that compromise is involved in this approach, but by following through with it, marigolden is hoping other artists can feel empowered and encouraged to prioritise their wellbeing over following a performative script.
“I went to Japan in November last year and decided to go off socials for a little while,” outlines marigolden. “When I did that, I had a total existential crisis about my relationship with music, and I opted out of going back online in that way as a result.
“I spent time wondering if there was a way I can keep releasing music that keeps my focus where it should be – the music. That’s why I’ve landed where I have with releasing this EP. But I don’t want to detract from the way that people connect on social media. It’s just not for me.”
She recognised that social media doesn’t support the way she wants to be an artist, and rather a constant engagement with it has the propensity to be reductive of her craft, as well as detrimental to her wellbeing.
“The way that we ask artists to share is very much personal,” expresses marigolden. “Not only in the sense of very deep, vulnerable stuff, but their daily lives as well. And so, it [social media] becomes something that you start thinking about all the time.
“It feels like Linkedin for musicians. And I have a tendency for self-comparison, so being flooded by constant highlight reels is really challenging. To be honest, it also makes me a bad friend because rather than celebrating people’s wins I’m judging myself. I think there’s people that can do [social media] really well. But for me, I get way too caught up in it and I just noticed my well-being increased a lot when I started not being there all the time.”
Ultimately, marigolden wants to focus on the storytelling aspect of her musicianship, an expression that requires more significant connection with audiences.
“I’ve been saying that I want it to be about the stories,” she iterates. “And now I’m trying to figure out how I can share those stories in a way that feels like they can really be held and have the space to breathe.
“Live music spaces are where stories can flourish in the best way. And newsletters, long-form writing, live videos, that’s where my focus is heading. I want to be able to share with people the stories of what happened in the studio, or things that emerged when I was writing or exploring songwriting techniques.
“Those are the things that feel really special to me, but I don’t want it to just be a caption on a post. I want it to be shared in a space where people can feel the layering of it all.”
“It just always comes back to my well-being and how I can stick around in the music space for as long as possible. That’s what this EP is about, really. It’s called Long Game. And the whole point of it is, how can I do this sustainably?
“And so, throughout the whole process I keep asking myself in relation to every decision I have to make – does it feel good? And if in my gut it doesn’t, then I probably just won’t do it.”
Social media has proven to be a useful tool for some, but marigolden’s approach has the capacity to invite in a different relationship to it that honours her needs. She beckons the welcoming of a seasonality, and a departure from the homogenised expectations that can force artists into situations that don’t feel healthy or sustainable.
Her debut EP Long Game is set to be released mid-2026.
