At the heart of The Belle Curves is Long Island, New York-based singer-songwriter Delaney Hafener, who seeks to create sensitive, personal songs that take an empathetic look at the world through others’ eyes. Hafener writes songs of love and loss, but with a much greater focus on family and friends than on cliched romantic relationships, as she explains: “If we prioritise always talking about romantic relationships, then we end up looking at all the other connections in our life through a lens that’s really flattening. If you think about it, life gets its texture from all the different people in our lives who make it interesting. You can have a platonic friend where there’s much more intensity and depth, and where it’s much more complicated, than someone who you were seeing romantically for four months. And sibling relationships can be really intense because you have so much baggage with your siblings.” Her thoughtful and thought-provoking songs reflect her anti-capitalist, queer, folk-rock approach to life and music.
We’re delighted to premiere The Belle Curves new single ‘Rosé Drive-Thru’. This is a song full of engaging melody that builds steadily until thumping drums and jangling guitars lead us to the conclusion. The singing is excellent, with Hafener’s voice complemented well by the tuneful, harmonising backing vocals. The accompanying video intersperses performance footage, which demonstrates the quality of the band, and images of travelling through The Hamptons. It’s this experience of hugely different lives that informs the song.
Hafener explains what the song means to her: “Long Island is home to some of the richest zip codes in America, many of them on the island’s south fork in ‘the Hamptons’. In the fall of 2020, I was working from home in my family’s old farmhouse and doing a lot of freelance audio work in East Hampton, and there’s really only one main road to get out there. It goes past highly manicured estates, golf courses, and vineyards. It’s really beautiful. There is one particular winery known for its rosé (which is honestly really delicious) and they had a sign on the side of the road for a while that said “rosé drive-thru” on it. As in, you could go pick up your bottles of wine to bring back to your beach house that you escaped to from the upper east side or park slope and not have to risk getting covid. It was so incredibly ‘let them eat cake’ and it just stuck with me. I grew up in a low-income community, where kids I went to school with may not have stable housing, and the only food they get each day is the school lunches. I have a complicated relationship with my hometown, as most people do, but I am forever grateful for the empathy that living there gave me. The beauty and comfort of the Hamptons is so enticing though, and the whole time I was doing this freelance work I found myself feeling removed from regular, working people. My family had just left my hometown and moved one town over to live in the old farmhouse that used to be my grandparents’. I would leave this comfortable big house where I live for free with my parents, get on the highway, and see mostly only beautiful things on my leisurely drive east. The first time I left home and went west instead of east was actually kind of jarring, and I remember thinking, ‘Woah, it is very easy to forget how most people are experiencing this pandemic, and this economy more broadly.’ I don’t ever want to forget that.”
The single is taken from The Belle Curves’ brand new album ‘Watershed’, which was released in June 2022. When writing ‘Watershed’, Hafener’s aim was to build on the history and traditions of country music, while giving it the space to grow and be refreshed, inspired by the podcast ‘Cocaine and Rhinestones’ and the online publication ‘Country Queer’, both of which open her eyes to the possibilities. This single is a great entry to the album – enjoy.
