Romy a.k.a. Romy Madley Croft a.k.a. Romy xx a.k.a. Romy from The xx a.k.a. Romy, not from Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion. However you define her, one of the most recognizable voices in British music has finally graced us with a solo single. Considering fellow bandmate Jamie xx has usually been the one we’ve counted on for “side projects”–or solo careers, if that’s how one prefers to phrase it–this unexpected gift proves that Romy was hiding her unchaperoned talents from the spotlight all along.
Entitled “Lifetime” and produced by Marta Salogni (who has worked with The xx, as well as M.I.A., FKA Twigs and Frank Ocean) and Fred Again, the rhythmic, 80s-centric beat is a jubilant defiance against the conditions presented by 2020. In fact, the content of the song is intended as a hopeful anthem for when people might one day be “fully” reunited again, and of “being totally in [that] moment and celebrating it.” Taking into account The xx’s last release, I See You, was from three years ago, this amuse-bouche for a complete solo album from Romy comes at a much overdue time. What’s more, the usual tincture of regret and melancholia of The xx’s sound on that aforementioned record has been entirely replaced with a tone of pure joy on this particular single.
A joy that acknowledges the rarity of not only being happy, but finding someone you truly love who brings out that state. The thematic elements of the song, indeed, remind one of the 2012 apocalypse rom-com, Seeking A Friend For the End of the World. Romy similarly seems to have found her perfect person just as things appear to be coming to an unavoidable and cataclysmic finale (and who can blame any of us for feeling the end is nigh with the way the past year has gone?–even if it already has been nigh well before this point). So it is that she croons, “You know I’ll never let this feeling go to waste/No, oh no/No way… And if you’re ever lonely/If you can’t find the way/If this world comes to an end/I wanna be there with you.”
Just another case in point that capitalism ultimately comes to nothing when we finally bring this world to a close. For, despite what the Egyptian pharaohs wanted to believe, our possessions cannot cradle us and keep us safe or reassured when death by disaster finally hits. No, instead, one would prefer to measure the value of their life in the relationships they’ve cultivated (this, too, being the grand message of A Christmas Carol, and, well, basically any 80s movie featuring a rich dude as a “protagonist”). The simple yet affecting chorus, “Once in a lifetime, once in a lifetime” is complemented with lyrics of l’amour delivered with the earnestness that only a Decade of Excess pop star could carry off, including, “Oh this is a high that I can’t get from nobody else/Oh I will not forget the rhythm that your heart makes when it beats in your chest.”
Even the accompanying lyric video has all the trappings of a VHS tape playing on a karaoke screen, the likes of which would be showing the words to “Love Is A Battlefield” for its bar troll to sing along to. At the two minute mark, a striking a capella moment occurs as Romy wisely sings, “Once in a lifetime, something matters/I wanna tell you this matters to me/It’s never the right time, so just let it happen/Oh, let it happen.” The beat then kicks back in at two minutes and thirty seconds as we’re left still reeling from Romy’s haunting words of wisdom. And the fact that it’s taken her this long to show the world what she’s really capable of all on her own.
Naturally, like Jamie xx, she still possesses the distinct sonic vibe of The xx, but it is entirely rebranded into something Tiffany and Debbie Gibson could get on board with had they been familiar with the concept of “indie” at the time. With any luck, Romy might grace us with the rest of the contents of this record before year’s end.
