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PREMIERE | essence Drops '1000 Pieces'

Tender, Radiant Vocals and Scrumptious Savors

Photo Courtesy essence

Black Wings is the latest album from Essence Goldman, aka essence. Today, Popdust premieres essence's music video for "1000 Pieces," from the album.

Shot one foggy afternoon in the Redwood Grove behind the Rose Garden in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, the song is "about a deep feeling between two people, a life-altering connection that for countless reasons cannot be pursued."

An award winning singer-songwriter, essence won the Grand Prize in the National Lilith Fair Talent Search, as well as the Great American Song Contest. She has toured nationally, opening for Jason Mraz, Tom Petty, Sarah McLachlan, Natalie Merchant, Chrissie Hynde, Steve Miller, Pat Benatar, and Linda Perry. She also released a children's album, A Dog Named Moo, named Album of The Year by Daily Candy.

In addition, essence is the lead singer of Bernie & The Believers, a band formed by Bernie Dalton, who was diagnosed with ALS at the age of 47. Wanting to maximize the time he had left, Bernie decided to record an album, leaving a musical legacy for his future grandchildren. essence started a Go Fund Me campaign that made the album a reality.

After making a video for one of the songs, "Unusual Boy," Bernie & The Believers submitted the video to Bob Boilen at NPR for the Tiny Desk video contest. Shot at Bernie's bedside in his nursing home, the video moved Bob Boilen so much that he featured the song and the story behind it on All Songs Considered, saying, "It is, at once, devastating and beautiful."

"1000 Pieces" opens with an acoustic guitar and surfacing colors from the organ, followed by essence's gorgeous tones. The melody fuses folk, pop, and rock-lite flavors into a tune suffused with nuances of glistening colors and tender harmonics.

essence's voice, affluently bedizened with smooth textures, ranges from soft and hushed to buff hues, high-pitched and crystalline.

The video, directed by Ethan Gold, depicts two lovers in surreal surroundings, hoary trees and oozing fog, as their ill-fated relationship plays out.

"1000 Pieces" coruscates with intimate energy, scrumptious vocals, and a gentle graceful intensity. It's a wonderfully alluring song, made so by essence's exquisitely lustrous voice.

Follow essence Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Bernie & The Believers


Randy Radic is a Left Coast author and writer. Author of numerous true crime books written under the pen-name of John Lee Brook. Former music contributor at Huff Post.


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