Ripe Fruit by Michaela Betts

‘I may be dysfunctional, but I’m not hurting anyone/I’m ready for the ripe fruit,’ sings half-Swedish UK-based singer songwriter Michaela Betts, on the title track of her solo debut EP Ripe Fruit. Weaving crystalline piano melodies with vivid vocals and industrial effects, Michaela creates a cinematic folk pop, what she calls ‘Dark Disney’. Her songs are adult fairy tales, about key life moments, threading together with delicate tension remembered moments of childhood monsters, lost love, family ties and the discovery of one’s soul mate.

Recorded throughout 2020 in the shipping container studio in her garden, and co-produced with partner Jon Griffin (Ichinchilla, Lee Shale), her Ripe Fruit EP is like a transcendent suite. Starting with the baroque piano and flowing vocals of Ripe Fruit, a pagan hymn to the force of nature, it moves to the malevolence of The Rose, with its dark, industrial loops and weeping cello (played by the acclaimed Sophie Gledhill). Only Love traces a heady but destructive relationship, while Carousel features Karen Street’s accordion in a song about reaching, as a young mother, a point of stillness. The set concludes with a loving vignette, studded with evocative images – ‘We had an intimate exchange/I felt you coming into range/Was it fate or was it chance/You weren’t looking for romance.’

Ripe Fruit is a stunning debut that encompasses all of Michaela’s influences – from Prince to Schubert to Judee Sill, and film composers like David Hirschfelder and Carmine Coppola. Previous projects include two albums with art-pop band Theghostorchestra, and her voice graces many soundtracks, including Slipstream (directed by David Van Eyssen) and Teknolust starring Tilda Swinton. This release will be followed by a filmed live set at The Premises, a short film, and live dates in the spring. Welcome to her world.

Michaela’s Dark Disney / Baroque-pop has emerged from years of writing & session singing. She has released albums with theghostorchestra, is vocalist on the films Slipstream & Teknolust. Born in Antwerp & raised in a rambling house in Yorkshire,
she is the daughter of travelling musicians. Her Grandfather was writer Bengt Nerman, his father Ture Nerman, a famous socialist who met Lenin in 1917.

michaelabetts.co.uk