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In 'Your Moon,' Rosie Carney Sings With Weary Grace

Rosie Carney.
Kim Benson
/
Courtesy of the artist
Rosie Carney.

Already an industry veteran at 20, Rosie Carney writes songs that feel lived-in and worn, conveying a bruised ache well beyond her years. The Irish singer-songwriter has been letting singles trickle out for a few years now, and her latest, "Your Moon," strikes a sure-footed balance between airy tenderness and coolly jazzy melancholy.

Carney signed and lost a record deal while still a teenager, yet each successive song finds her reaching more of her considerable potential. This year, she's begun opening up about her battles with mental illness, writing candidly and thoughtfully about her experiences on her website, so it makes sense that her newest songs capture the weary grace of a survivor who's located the source of her strength.

"'Your Moon' is a song written about realizing different truths within yourself or within a relationship, and finding meaning in that truth," Carney writes via email. "I wanted to capture the feeling of realizing that [just because] the circumstances and timing may seem right in things, doesn't necessarily mean that it is what's truly best for you. We spend a lot of time doing things for other people in life, focusing on what's best for someone else, and trying to please people. But sometimes we have to realize what's truly best for ourselves and what would be more beneficial in the bigger picture. It's about being selfish in the best possible way, and not being afraid to put yourself first."

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Stephen Thompson is a writer, editor and reviewer for NPR Music, where he speaks into any microphone that will have him and appears as a frequent panelist on All Songs Considered. Since 2010, Thompson has been a fixture on the NPR roundtable podcast Pop Culture Happy Hour, which he created and developed with NPR correspondent Linda Holmes. In 2008, he and Bob Boilen created the NPR Music video series Tiny Desk Concerts, in which musicians perform at Boilen's desk. (To be more specific, Thompson had the idea, which took seconds, while Boilen created the series, which took years. Thompson will insist upon equal billing until the day he dies.)