Sydney-based industrial sound designer Jessica O’Donoghue describes the compositions on her new album Rise Up as “post-Baroque dramatic pop.” Across eight songs and 40 minutes of music, O’Donoghue draws on her academic training – she has a BMus from Sydney Uni and a Diploma of Opera from the VCA – to merge operatic elements with warm synthesisers and corporeal rhythms.
O’Donoghue worked on the album with producer Alyx Dennison, formerly of the experimental pop band Kyu and responsible for the severely underrated solo album, 2015’s Alyx Dennison.
Jessica O’Donoghue: Rise Up
O’Donoghue has called Rise Up “a woman’s journey.” “It goes from hopes, dreams and promises to dark times, challenges, sacrifices and doubting/questioning to acceptance, nurturing and healing, to celebrating and honouring the feminine story and experience,” O’Donoghue said.
To further contextualise the genre-agnostic manoeuvring on Rise Up, here’s a rundown of the album’s defining characteristics.
Five things that characterise Jessica O’Donoghue’s Rise Up
Grand and intimate. O’Donoghue turns up the dramatic pop dial by fusing operatic grandeur with a sense of intimacy that burrows deep.
A continuous journey. Rise Up is a continuous musical journey, featuring an eclectic lineup of musicians whose disparate backgrounds reflect the breadth of O’Donoghue’s musical vocabulary. Led by O’Donoghue’s vocals, the album combines industrial electronic programming, soaring synths, tribal drums, four-part vocal harmonies, French horns and strings.
Family tragedy. The songs on Rise Up were created in the shadow of family tragedy. O’Donoghue began writing the music following the death of her father, the popular Australian musician Rory O’Donoghue, resulting in a deeply personal album that explores the process of finding light in darkness. The album, designed to be heard from beginning to end, is focused on letting go and rising up, seeking the illuminating knowledge that comes from experience.
Femininity. Rise Up honours and celebrates the feminine in nature: softness, beauty, fierce power and the ability to hold and nurture the world and everyone in it.
Epic and mysterious. Working with producer Alyx Dennison and engineer David Trumpanis (Sarah Blasko, Seeker Lover Keeper, The Voice), Rise Up is O’Donoghue’s most epic, mysterious and ambitious album yet.
Jessica O’Donoghue – ‘Let It Flow’
Further Reading
Jessica O’Donoghue Upends Genre with ‘Let It Flow’
Rat Child Recalls Macy Gray and Nina Simone on ‘Love Facilitator’
Love Letter to a Record: Cousin Tony’s Brand New Firebird on Talk Talk’s ‘Spirit of Eden’
