Deliberate Existence

Gossling owns that voice you at first thought was Joanna Newsom's, but couldn't place why it made you feel uncanny to leave that conclusion there. It was too chirpy to be Newsom, surely – and there was something in her delivery that was a bit curter, perhaps a bit feistier, even a little more earnest. So yes, that was in fact Gossling, who, it should be known, is not only a singer-songwriter called Helen Croome from country Victoria, but who has a new EP out, called Intentional Living.

The first single from that EP is the collaborative effort Wild Love.

“I had a bit of a writing block for a while there,” Croome softly explains of the song's creation, “and the idea came up that I should get together with some other musos and collaborate, and see if anything came out of it. I caught up with Dann [Hume – Evermore], and we wrote the foundations of Wild Love, and then I went away and collaborated with a few other people, and though none of those other jam sessions created anything for the EP, they got the juices flowing, and I was able to come home, and write the other tracks.

“I just really wanted to get some new music out as I hadn't done any in over a year. As an independent artist, [an EP] was really the thing I could come out with the quickest, so I thought I'd do another one, and then concentrate on an album [after] this one's released in April.”

That's three EP's Croome's released in a row now. It's put to her that maybe she doesn't feel within herself entirely ready for an album yet, either.

“That's true, actually,” she admits. “I find the idea of an album a bit daunting, as far as having a complete…soundscape, and a complete message. I think I can do an EP alright, and it's safer for me.”

But it's not solely a confidence thing, she assures. It's not even entirely about where she feels she is artistically at this point. Creating an album, for Croome, is so much a confluence of small difficulties from all of these influences that, for the here and now, an EP simply expresses her most able self.

“I think just because, being an independent artist, and being self-managed for a lot of my career, I've had to concentrate on lots of other aspects,” she answers thoughtfully. “Being able to be creative was easier just to do just through doing an EP.” She adds, after a thought, “Look, I want to do an album! I just have to work a few things out before I'm able get there.”

But back to her current output now, and if one was to approximate what an album of Gossling's would sound like, she assures that at least thematically it wouldn't stray too far from what we've heard from her so far.

“I guess a lot of my songs have a theme of love in them,” she says, “which just seems to be what comes out of me the easiest. I've never [done anything like] sat down and thought about an overall theme for each EP; they've all just come out like that.”

And, though there's a lot of love in music to go around, one thing that will forever distinguish Gossling's sound from her peers' is that incredible, unique voice of hers.

“You know, I don't actually enjoy listening to myself sing,” she laughs. “It makes me a bit nervous listening to myself, for some reason. I get that I'm…different. I'm confident in my singing abilities, but I don't know! I don't really enjoy listening to myself a lot.”