Dreams, Heartbreak, and Longing: Michele’s ‘Mirage’

Following up her previous release ‘Glad (to be yours)’ which featured LA-based rapper Adam Nabeel, Dubai’s Michele dropped ‘Mirage’ earlier this week, ditching the dream-pop infused RnB flavor of her previous releases in favor of a more minimal approach.

<iframe width="100%" height="300" scrolling="no" frameborder="no" allow="autoplay" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/875933743&color=%23ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=true&show_comments=false&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&show_teaser=false&visual=true"></iframe><div style="font-size: 10px; color: #cccccc;line-break: anywhere;word-break: normal;overflow: hidden;white-space: nowrap;text-overflow: ellipsis; font-family: Interstate,Lucida Grande,Lucida Sans Unicode,Lucida Sans,Garuda,Verdana,Tahoma,sans-serif;font-weight: 100;"><a href="https://soundcloud.com/listentomichele" title="michele." target="_blank" style="color: #cccccc; text-decoration: none;">michele.</a> · <a href="https://soundcloud.com/listentomichele/mirage" title="mirage" target="_blank" style="color: #cccccc; text-decoration: none;">mirage</a></div>

Melancholic, reverb soaked guitars set the mood almost immediately, and around the midpoint of the song, an unexpected violin paves the way for the emergence of a full orchestral string section, fully hammering home Michele’s somber yearning for a past lover to return and take her away from a world of chaos and darkness. 

Michele’s soulful — albeit rather bleak — vocal styling builds in intensity over the course of ‘Mirage’, finally reaching their point of catharsis to a backdrop of thundering kick drums and the pitter-patter of light percussion.