SHARES HER EXPERIENCES OF BPD WITH THE NEW SINGLE ‘OVERWHELMING’ – LISTEN HERE / WATCH THE VIDEO HERE
“A promising crossover talent from the gothic scene.” – FAULT Magazine
“An alt-pop enigma with a dark aesthetic and a surprising pop influence.” – ODALïSQUE MAGAZINE
Just three singles in and Raven Numan is making a big impression. A beguiling black-heart of creativity, the 20-year-old flavours her dark wave roots with modernist alt-pop embellishments, while her lyrics bravely cut open her vulnerabilities for the world to see. Each release brings new admirers into her coven, with support so far including Daniel P. Carter at Radio 1, Kerrang!, Spotify’s Misfits 2.0 playlist and praise from Garbage. Meanwhile, her striking spectral style has been highlighted with shoots with FAULT and ODALïSQUE. The next stage is her evolution is now underway as she shares the new single ‘Overwhelming’.
Raven casts an icy demeanour in ‘Overwhelming’, with juddering beats, grinding industrial sonics and waves of engagingly unconventional vocal elements taking us deeper into her world. It’s a sweetly sinister cocktail that enshrouds lyrics which explore her visceral reaction to the noise around her – most literally and metaphorically – as her BPD triggers a dissociative state.
Raven says, “‘Overwhelming’ is somewhat self-explanatory, it’s about being overwhelmed with everyone and everything, it’s also about growing up with a famous parent and how it’s affected me personally. My parents are incredible, they’ve done absolutely everything and more for me and I love them endlessly but a big part of their job is going on tour for long periods of time and that has quite obviously affected me negatively.
The song is partially about that; how my parents going on tour as a child caused me to develop quite a lot of issues. It caused me to develop borderline personality disorder which involves the constant fear of being abandoned, severe mood swings, anxiety and it has also caused extreme social anxiety. The loudness of this lifestyle, the shows, my dad’s fame, the unpredictability, the fans, the unnecessary hate all because I was born caused so much stress and it was a lot for me to handle. It’s about totally shutting down and disassociating because everything was very overwhelming.”
‘Overwhelming’ was written solely by Raven.
The pulsating paranoia and anxieties of the song are heightened by the accompanying video , which was directed by Jackson Ducasse (Dua Lipa, Imagine Dragons). Captured in a crimson palette a blonde-haired Raven performs with searing intensity, her angst growing as she’s followed by a gathering of partially hidden people – but are her fears grounded in reality, or is her mind twisting her surroundings into something far more sinister than they really are?
As a child, Raven grew up surrounded by her father Gary’s music and wasn’t particularly interested – but how many kids are fascinated by their parents’ professions? Instead her first passion was the larger-than-life pop of Ariana Grande. But it wasn’t long before his music inspired her, as did the work of electric friends such as Nine Inch Nails and Ministry, not to mention influences such as Deftones, Lana Del Rey and Siouxsie & The Banshees.
Writing her own music provided a release from her emotional and psychological battles: a way to find peace rather than to lash-out at loved ones. By her mid-teens she was writing seriously, bringing a world of other genre touchpoints to her synth-pop core but all the while talking candidly about the issues in life that she struggles with. She makes it sound effortless, but she never found being so candid an easy experience, especially within her tumultuous teenage years.
Now, though, there’s a remarkable confidence to everything she does – as also recently demonstrated when she joined Gary Numan on-stage at both of his shows at London’s Roundhouse.