Bec Sandridge has shared their first new single in three years – a punchy dance-pop number titled ‘Cost Of Love’ – alongside the announcement of a new EP and headline tour.
In a press release, the Illawarra-native artist described their new song as what would happen “if Shania Twain and Daft Punk met at an ’80s aerobics class, sweatily hooked up and had a gay baby”. They co-wrote it with Not A Boys Name frontman Dave Jenkins Jr and his partner Lucy Taylor, while longtime collaborator Gab Strum (aka Japanese Wallpaper) aided in its production.
Have a look at the visualiser for ‘Cost Of Love’, helmed by Sandridge and visual artist Sam Brumby, below:
Expounding on its creation, Sandridge noted that when they were writing ‘Cost Of Love’, they were “stuck in a kind of tug-of-war, arm-wrestle” with theirself, “weighing up whether a certain relationship was worth it (the unraveling of a thread, the push and pull in compromise, digging up old and new dirt)”.
Sandridge continued: “It felt like I had lost myself in a relationship that had a relatively frail foundation. Despite the rockiness of the whole thing, we kept trying to build upon it beyond the use-by date… I guess, we attempted to roll the shit in shit-tonnes of glitter to a degree.
“This song was my attempt to explore being logical in love and answer the question, ‘How do you know when to call it before you lose all of yourself and in turn, each other?’”
‘Cost Of Love’ was premiered on triple j’s Home And Hosed last night (June 15), and comes as the first single from Sandridge’s upcoming third EP, ‘Lost Dog’. The EP will be released independently on October 7, and serves as the follow-up to their debut album, 2019’s ‘Try + Save Me’.
On the record’s thematic basis, Sandridge said: “I was a bit of a lost dog, myself and I also lost my dog. This EP is a snapshot of that time.” Their primary aim in the songwriting process was to “take time and write [their] best songs to date”, they said, admitting that on ‘Try + Save Me’, they “hadn’t gone as far as [they] could in terms of angularity and the whole gloss-pop thing”.
“I wanted to really sit in that pocket,” Sandridge continued. “To me, this lot of songs feels like driving into a sunset, no sunglasses, with an ache in the pit of your stomach: it’s sickeningly beautiful, temporarily blinding and also, signifying the end of a big ol’ chapter.”
Prior to the EP’s release, Sandridge will embark on a four-date tour of the Australian east coast. The run kicks off in Melbourne on Friday August 5, with shows in Sydney and Canberra set to follow the next week. It’ll wrap up in Brisbane on Thursday August 25.
Support for all four shows will come from Melbourne indie-pop artist Montgomery and Sydney singer-songwriter Huck Hastings. Tickets are on sale now – find them here.
Though ‘Cost Of Love’ is Sandridge’s first proper release since ‘Try + Save Me’, they’ve kept busy over the break. In 2020, they linked up with the aforementioned Not A Boys Name for the joint single ‘Fuck It Up’. Later, Sandridge contributed a new Xavier Dunn remix of their 2015 single ‘In The Fog, In The Flame’ to Farmer & The Owl’s ‘Family Values’ compilation.
Bec Sandridge’s ‘Cost Of Love’ tour dates are:
AUGUST
Friday 5 – Naarm/Melbourne, Northcote Social Club
Thursday 11 – Eora/Sydney, Mary’s Underground
Friday 12 – Ngunnawal Country/Canberra, UC Hub
Thursday 25 – Meanjin/Brisbane, Black Bear Lodge