Fifi Rong soothes social isolation with her vulnerable song ‘Distance’

Fifi Rong, a mul­ti-tal­ent­ed artist based in Lon­don, has released a haunt­ing new song about the emo­tion­al effects of social isolation.

The apt­ly titled ‘Dis­tance’ is a melan­cholic song, lay­ered with soft gui­tar and bass lines, and equal­ly soft whis­pers by Rong. The vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty she express­es in her grace­ful voice is some­thing many will be feel­ing right now, as the Coro­n­avirus lock­down con­tin­ues around the world.

“The theme of the song sur­rounds the feel­ing of dis­tance and iso­la­tion, and it’s record­ed from an inter­nalised and inti­mate place that invites pri­vate lis­ten­ing,” Rong told Fringe Fre­quen­cy.

“I hope peo­ple can res­onate with and find com­fort in the song, as we spend time being alone in these unprece­dent­ed times.”

‘Dis­tance’ is the lat­est song the Chi­nese-British musi­cian has shared from a forth­com­ing album, which she said is a col­lec­tion of many indi­vid­ual love stories.

Rong wrote and pro­duced ‘Dis­tance’ herself.

Speak­ing about the process, she said: “I have tried to pro­duce this song a few times in the past, and record­ed a few times too, but I was nev­er hap­py about them.

“Some­times a song needs to wait till the right moment to be born. I think this is its time, and I’m final­ly hap­py with the min­i­mal­ist approach and vocal deliv­ery for the song. I think the more a song is try­ing to express, the more naked it should be, sonically.”

Rong’s stripped back sound brings to mind Mar­ti­na Top­ley-Bird and FKA Twigs.

With the UK on lock­down and no crew to help make a video, Rong has cre­at­ed some home­made visu­als to accom­pa­ny her melan­cholic single.

Ear­li­er this year, Rong also released ‘Love is a Lone­ly Thing’, with an accom­pa­ny­ing music video, which took inspi­ra­tion from Wong Kar-Wai’s roman­tic film, Mood for Love.

Rong is tire­less­ly cre­ative. She has con­tributed to music by Tricky, Yel­lo, and UK grime star Skep­ta. And, when she’s not work­ing on her own avant-garde music, she can be found mod­el­ling and col­lab­o­rat­ing with oth­er creatives.

You can keep up with Fifi Rong on Insta­gram and Twit­ter.

‘Dis­tance’ will be released inde­pen­dent­ly by Fifi Rong on April 24, 2020. You can add the song to your Spo­ti­fy library here.

Image: Dylan Chubb