Listen: Charlie Cunningham - "Outside Things" [Premiere]
“None of us can remember what it was like to be a baby, but it must have been pretty overwhelming. “Outside Things” is about that.” So says Oxford’s Charlie Cunningham of his debut single “Outside Things”, premiering today on Best Fit.
That quote isn’t just PR fluff: armed only with an acoustic guitar, Cunningham capably explores the visceral nature of life outside the womb. With raking hand strums held in check by the beat of the singer-songwriter’s palm against the bridge, “Outside Things” is instantly discernible from your typical solo sad bastard fare. This is more Rodrigo y Gabriela than Damien Rice, perhaps owing to Cunningham’s time studying guitar in Seville.
Filling the space with impassioned vocals, Cunningham imagines the confusion (“it's a boy, it's a boy, it's a boy, I don’t know what all that means”) and helplessness (“I’ma get back inside, you can rely on your mother”) of a newborn in stunning fashion. Exploring an experience that is both universal and unknowable, he sounds far more comfortable (and, perhaps, far less creepy) than you’d expect from a young solo artist. Then again, the brilliance of “Outside Things” may be a sign that it’s time to readjust our expectations for Charlie Cunningham.
"Outside Things" appears on Cunningham's forthcoming EP of the same title.
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