Premiere: Olivia Castriota romanticizes the mundane with a ‘Weekend Lover’

Love is wickedly sly. It works in unfathomable ways, and sometimes, its mundanity can be as striking as whisking away for a late-night rendezvous by the lake, the silvering moon lapping up the water and smirking back at two lovers spooning on the shoreline. To be in love, you have to expect the expected, because there can just be no more to it than that. Soul-pop singer Olivia Castriota, out of New York, steadies herself and her wavering adoration of another with “Weekend Lover,” a tasty, chocolate-infused strip of stunning romanticism.

Three years since her debut album, Castriota’s voice has ripened and sweetened as a bunch of concord grapes plumping on the vine in the sweltering summer. “Weekend Lover,” a co-write with Zach Berkman, is as sugary, in that the tang of uncertainty has been drained and discarded. At her will, the song percolates and drips with charm; she’s the girl-next-door type that dreams big but instantly realizes that what she desires most is right in front of her. “You always tell me the same things / I know how you swing / And I know who you are,” she sings, sweet laced in creamy vanilla puddles.

On the song, she explains to B-Sides & Badlands, premiering it today, “‘Weekend Lover’ is inspired by a relationship that’s completely predictable ⎯⎯ being with someone whose every single move can be anticipated; feeling like you want to live this spontaneous life but yet you’re totally consumed, in the best way possible, by this unwavering person. The Weekend Lover in the song is the King of Consistency, sweet and dependable like coffee and pancakes on a Sunday morning. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t… but you’re in love and you kind of like it.”

Castriota, who draws upon such trailblazers as Etta James and Joss Stone, relishes in the familiar with a dazzling earnestness. It’s her passion that soaks the record most, and while walking the same path doing the same things on what feels like the same day is boring for some, Castriota is just comfortable with that. And so are we.

New singles are expected to drop throughout the rest of the year. Stay tuned.

Listen below:

Photo Credits: Dylan Perlot (photographer), Dina Vibes (stylist), The Face by Kase (makeup) and Helene Marie (hair)

Follow Castriota on her socials: Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | Website