Here is ‘Monochrome’, the final single to be released from Runnner’s brand new album, ‘Always Repeating’. Runnner is the name under which LA-based multi-instrumentalist Noah Weinman creates his absorbing, introspective songs. On this, Weinman plays guitar, banjo, bass, piano and synth, bringing the instruments together in subtle layers that build and swell gently drawing us into his intimate reflections and musical world.
This is a song of isolation and alienation. It was written at a time when Weinman had to leave behind his life in Ohio and move back home to LA, partly because he didn’t know where else to go. There’s a real sense of nostalgia, of looking back at what has been lost while uncertain about what Weinman is moving towards. This melancholy is felt through all the songs on the new album. Weinman says: “I began to feel like all of the people I knew and had met maybe never really existed. I fell out of touch with everyone. It was really lonely. I wrote these songs as a way of reaching out and trying to reconnect.” Of course, this also makes his music feel particularly relevant right now, in a world in which disconnection and social distance has become the norm.
Lyrically, ‘Monochrome’ is full of narrative details and intelligent observations. Weinman reflects on the song: “Although this isn’t the oldest song in the batch, this feels like the first Runnner song. As soon as I wrote it I knew I wouldn’t feel comfortable bringing it into my band at the time. I was really missing my friends and they all seemed so far away that it somehow felt like they never existed. It’s about nuance and memory, and how hard it can be to remember something in all its color and detail. Part of me fights against that and tries to remember everything, but part of me also resigns to it.” Be absorbed.
