Twenty-two-year-old singer-songwriter Abby Sage is wise beyond her years. At 22 she had already fallen in love, but she knew she was too young to understand it. Four years later she presents a song about the experience and how she perceives it now, as a bit more enlightened.
Videos by American Songwriter
“’18 Years’ is an important story that I’ve been attempting to tell the right way for a while now,” Sage told American Songwriter. “For me, ‘18 Years’ represents both a solidified age and an estimated measure of time. I fell in love at the age of 18 but I needed 18 more years to understand it. I needed 18 more years to figure out what that meant for me. It’s a love ballad longing for the right place and time.”
Sage will share more singles throughout the year, that she said will follow a similar theme and address matters of the heart, all of which will be included on her forthcoming debut EP. The songwriter anticipates she will release three more songs by the end of 2020, after a summer in the studio. And when it came time to record the current single, Sage was more than prepared, as she had been brewing it up for quite some time.
“I wrote it [’18 Years’] about a year ago and sat with it for so long, but every time I played songs of mine for friends, this is the one that resonated the most,” she said. “Having that one fleeting love that you hold onto, make excuses for, and keep in your mind as that ‘maybe someday’ person is such a universal human experience. I had a moment where I was driving on my own back from the studio one day and I felt this overwhelming feeling of love for someone in my past. The beautiful thing was that it wasn’t a feeling of longing, it was pure appreciation for someone who I so deeply loved before. Regardless, I still carry that question of ‘maybe someday down the road’ but now that I’ve written about it, the feeling is less pressing; it’s off my chest and into the world now.”
“18 Years” fortifies itself in gentle guitar work and Sage’s wispy, graceful vocals that wander cleverly through the song, complete with tiny runs, showcasing her skilled and refined voice, all wrapped in a melancholy box.
Sage’s talents are rooted in her upbringing, when she frequently watched her dad perform at various clubs. With a musically inclined family, Sage has been fiddling around on guitar for the better part of her life, although it wasn’t the instrument that had her attention. She used it more as a catapulting tool for her songwriting. Artists like Amy Winehouse and Norah Jones were a big kickstarter to Sage’s interest and further exploration into songwriting. By the time Sage reached her early teenage years, she was already sharing her songs online, but by total accident. It started out as a secret endeavor until she unknowingly hit the wrong button on Soundcloud, injecting her music into the hands of others. Encouraged by all the flattering comments she received shortly after Sage realized her path had been forged. Her songs eventually grabbed the attention of Canadian artist development company, The Post Office, who further propelled her career.
Sage has since released her breakout single, “Holy Water”, succeeded by the wisdom-boasting “18 Years” today. Keep your eyes and ears open for more singles to come from Sage in the coming months as well as her forthcoming debut EP Sunny Boy.
