Noa Jamir released her debut album, CICADA, on July 12 with a private album release event.
Her soft soothing vocals transmit a southern soul from Louisiana. The album is a somber soulful view of the struggles of growing up. It is a coming of age story that I can directly connect with.
In my late teens, I was faced with financial hardship, and was unable to continue at the junior college I was attending. It has been a long, hard road since then, but if I can provide any guidance to those out there, it would be to not allow the typical paths in life stop you from creating solutions for yourself, making plans (small and big), and acquiring knowledge from unconventional means.
Noa has taken a hardship in her life, and turned it into a positive. It is a beautiful testament to taking control of situation.
She watched her peers move on without her, and in February of that year, she wrote “Subside.”
Noa shares, “It is a song about being on the outside of everything you’ve once known, and learning who you are on your own. Writing this song gave me inspiration to start working on an album; I feel like it became the centerpiece and statement song for this project.”
“The title ‘Cicada’ came to me that summer. It was inspired by a walk I took to work every morning, in which I’d notice little cicada shells stuck to the trees and on fence posts. Something about cicadas resonated with me on a symbolic and spiritual level at that time. I did a lot of reading about them, and learned about how they spend years dormant underground, until ready to emerge in their shiny, new adult form. That really resonated with me. Most of 2023 felt like my own personal dormant hell, which I was slowly beginning to emerge from. That summer, I had just gotten sober, started going to therapy, decided to finish school, and found the energy to start picking up the pieces of my life.”
Recorded in New Orleans, the title “Cicada” is an ode to that hellish time in Noa’s life. She adds, “I hope it can convey hope of leaving a dark place better than you found it, while still acknowledging that it happened, and the ways in which it made you stronger.”
Stream the album on YouTube via Noa Jamir’s pageNoa Jamir’s page.
