Words by Paige Reynolds

It’s one of London’s many miserable June days when musician Rosie Lowe lights up the other side of the Zoom, stylish mid-century furniture peeking out from behind her.

She excitedly tells me that, after a long few years, renovations on her south London home are finally finished. A labour of love much like her just-released fourth studio album, Lover, Other. Released into the world on August 16th, the 15-track work is bursting with a musical excellence and artistic confidence that is testament to the more than ten years Lowe has spent in the British music industry. In 2013, the fresh Goldsmith’s graduate was signed by Paul Epworth-founded label Wolf Tone after catapulting onto the scene with her first EP Right Thing. Since then, Lowe has amassed an impressive catalogue of solo work and collaborations that fuse sophisticated soulful electronic-pop and alternative r&b and is always neatly brought together by her soft, rasp-inflected vocals. Lover, Other is no exception but pushes her sound further still. “I know myself now more than ever, and I’m more playful than I've ever been in my career,” Lowe says confidently. “Whereas before I might have heard something and thought, oh, that doesn't really feel like me. On this record I was very much not thinking like that.”

It’s a playfulness that has roots in Lowe’s action-packed childhood. As well as having a saxophonist, clarinettist and flautist for a father, Lowe is the youngest of six siblings who all used music to communicate with each other or more often, to squabble over who was allowed to love what. From piano to flute, violin to saxophone, guitar to singing, Lowe picked up any instrument she could find and wanted to play them all. An unruly passion for new things has stood the test of time. “I still think there’s nothing more humbling than picking up an instrument - and that learning process is good practice for other things in life too,” she says. As a child, Lowe was also exposed to an impressive live circuit. From Spice Girls to Soweto Kinch, Whitney Houston to Courtney Pine, Lowe and her siblings were periodically piled into the car and driven round the country for all kinds of gigs. “I once fell asleep in a chair in a stadium watching Annie Lenox,” Lowe remembers fondly, “And I was only six years old!”

With such a wealth of influences, it’s no surprise that Lowe never got stuck in the overthinking loop of strictly defining her sound - but one particular breakthrough at Goldsmiths stands out. An end of year project which tasked students to use only one instrument to produce an entire track. Lowe chose her voice. “I sang the bass, the guitar lines, the drums - and there was a really positive response to that,” she says. Taking ownership of the song’s production in its entirety was a crucial moment for Lowe as both an artist and producer “I think it can be really dangerous for young artists to rely on someone else behind a computer,” she says, “I love collaboration now, because I know myself - but I think when you’re not quite sure, it can be a tricky thing to navigate.”

While Lowe has been heavily involved in the production process of her past albums, there were often other creative forces that worked alongside her. Take her 2016 debut Control and 2019 follow-up, Yu, that were co-produced by guitarist and The Invisible-frontman Dake Okumu - or her critically-acclaimed album Son, co-created with London-based multidisciplinary artist Duval Timothy. Lowe is clearly no stranger to the expansive power of reciprocal creative relationships. However, with Lover, Other, Lowe’s first independent release, there was a greater eagerness to fully take the reins. “I made a decision right at the beginning that I was going to produce it,” she says firmly, “It was time to fly that flag more.”

This wasn’t the only point of difference; while at Wolf Tone, Lowe had tighter deadlines dictating the process. With Lover, Other, there was no real time pressure at all, enabling her to seek inspiration in places far from her South London home. From Berlin to Florence, the album took Lowe across Europe but the majority of it was conceptualised at Can Obert, a small artists’ residency in Northern Spain. Run by Uma Bunnag and Luke Bower (SALPA), both established musicians in their own right, Lowe was the pair’s first guest. There were some initial wobbles, Lowe’s lifelong fear of dogs not the best fit for Can Obert’s two resident canines, but it soon revealed itself to be nothing short of paradise. “I woke up on the first morning in the most beautiful old Spanish town, with church bells ringing and the birds singing,” she says, romantically painting the picture. “I even healed my fear of dogs!”

Musically, the trips to Can Obert form the backbone of the record. A fast friendship with Uma and Luke led to a vital creative partnership and feedback loop. “They became my second family,” Lowe reflects, and the initial 3-week trip became one of six across the past two years. The dreamlike set-up of Can Obert can be felt across many tracks on the record, including the sensual sonics of ‘Mood to Make Love’. “It was a very balmy summer’s evening at Can Obert and the final song really encapsulates what we felt in the moment” Lowe explains, going on to recount their schedule where long lunches and beach trips would precede the writing itself, which often took place from 9 pm until 4 am. And, like so many of the songs on the record, there’s simply something about the recording that feels alive. This could be partly to do with Lowe’s approach to vocals, where she made a concerted effort to shun the perfectionism of time gone-by.

“I was really obsessive about my vocals at one point; I’d re-record them over and over for hours, but it would take me further away from the music and wonder what the hell I was even singing about,” she says, shaking her head. At Can Obert, things were rather different. “A lot of the vocals have the sound of the dogs or the birds in them - and a lot of the vocals were done with Uma and Salpa in the room”, she says, explaining that it helped keep the energy of a performance, even if the odd chuckle crept in. This approach also comes from a love of imperfection Lowe has been leaning into.

“I love hearing vocals where maybe on one note the tuning is a little bit flat, but then the next note sounds more perfect because of it.” she says. “There’s just no freedom in perfectionism and I think freedom is what music is all about.” It was not only with vocal production where there was an intentional onus on the natural environment. “I was always sampling my surroundings,” she says. “I took a Zoom recorder everywhere whenever I went out for a walk, for dinner or to the beach.” It wasn’t just Can Obert where Lowe’s album took shape. There were multiple trips to Berlin to work with long-time collaborators and co-producers Lloyd Calderon-Polson (d’monk) and Harvey Grant, as well as solo trips to the French countryside and Tuscany.

“I really wanted to be doing a lot on my own when I could, and just responding to wherever I was” she says, but crucially only if she felt she needed to. “I went to Florence with all of my equipment, and I took it out once in two weeks!” This also feeds into Lowe’s lifelong obsession with sample culture. For this record, she upgraded to an SP2400 in an effort to be away from the computer and often sampled and re-sampled her own Zoom recordings or voice notes. ‘Lay Me’ - a jazz-inflected groove that comes near the end of the record - was entirely written to an old sample of Harvey Grant playing piano that Lowe had recorded at home, and a sample of the song ‘I Know’ by Japanese artist Makoto Matsushita gives Lowe’s moody ode to needing space ‘In The Morning’ its distinctive, haunting bookends.

Of course, getting samples cleared is another thing entirely. “It was tricky, because we contacted the label and they very much said we can't clear this, but I found an email online, contacted him directly and just said look, this is the song and I really want to sample it. And you know what? He came back and said, ‘I’m a new fan, I love it, please use it!’” she says. Lowe’s natural ability to form deep artist-to-artist connections once again shining through.

Another notable influence on the record is her love of old Disney music. The theatrical strings that open ‘Walk In the Park’ is one particular arrangement that feels like the score of an animated classic. “I’ve got this Spotify playlist of like a million old Disney songs, I love Snow White, I love Bambi!” Lowe admits, drawn to the way they recorded strings and vocals as well as the call and response patterns that often occur between parts. To imitate it on this track, Lowe pre-recorded backing vocals and passed the song back and forth with trusted collaborator Grant who added strings until Lowe was happy.

To record things, she took the über talented multi-instrumentalist Raven Bush to the Master Shipwrights House in Deptford, a big old house on the banks of the Thames, which came with its own share of challenges. “It was so windy that the windows were rattling, so I spent a lot of time trying to EQ it all out. That was a bit of a nightmare but I loved seeing it come together with actual, real instruments,” she says, sounding deservedly proud.

There are countless more stories within the 15-tracks that comprise Lover, Other but the overriding message both sonically and lyrically is one that reminds the listeners to be soft but brave and if nothing else, to take the time to acknowledge the process. “The whole album came at a very transitional time. I was in my early 30s just asking myself the bigger questions of life, my desires and needs, where I want to be and all that stuff. I think of it like a collage, balancing the line between life and death, self-doubt and self-assurance, ageing and youth.”

Philosophical as Lowe might be, it wasn’t all about searching for inner meaning. “I made a very clear decision when writing this album that the most important thing was having fun!” she smiles. “You have to enjoy the moment as much as possible - otherwise you’re always going to be chasing.”

Love, Other is out now via Blue Flowers Music.