VELATINE - Playing With The Orbits - [lyric] Australian #gothic Duo #darkwave #gothgirl 🖤

in memory of Bianca Devins 🖤🥀 This time we move the #gothic #darkwave vibe a little into #darkpop territory, we hope a sound she might have liked, we wanted this song to sound like her. Afterall, she was only seventeen when her life was cut short🖤🥀 RIP #biancadevins 🌹 I don’t even know Who’s watching me Afraid of the sun I am a shadow I know some of you Who are in love I’m making you feel deep and meaningful I’m tearing you apart Anonymous It’s something I don’t notice It’s something I can’t see But I’ll play Mmm let’s play ahhh You know I was the star Playing with the orbits I’m playing with the orbits I played with the orbits I had no tears I didn’t see you coming Didn’t taste any fear You said you didn’t like My blue hair You liked the blonde me Oh wait I don’t care I should've seen the signs The obsession with me Only now I have departed It’s all here to see I was playing with the orbits I played with no fear Strange how the tables turned A bad time of the year Playing with the orbits I played with the orbits Playing with the orbits I didn’t care I didn’t care The story of Playing With The Orbits & Bianca Devins from upstate New York. I never intended to write* such a complex press release for such a simple song but its presentation was paramount, and why this song is only surfacing now. Written around 5 years ago, her story shook me, and if you know the story then the lyrics reveal its underlying complexity. It's a song about her murder, it required sensitivity in its delivery. I didn’t see her as naive, she was intelligent, creative, an individual but sadly missed the signs that this was coming. She was exposed and became a target. A song that somehow waited for Holly to express all of this. Bianca was 17 when killed by an obsessed man, who she met online. Referred to as an “E-girl” by the media she was hardly that. In her teens she had struggled with anxiety, depression and the net had been an escape where she had bonded with others with similar struggles. She worked hard to resolve her own personal issues, finished school and planned to study psychology. In her case, her killer spread photos of the aftermath on social media that exploded her into “stardom” Hardly an influencer, just popular and likable online, she had about 2,000 followers on Instagram when her short life ended. Within days of her murder, though, that number had risen to more than 160,000. Incel groups were the main perpetrators spreading the pictures, also sending them to family members with vile messages, such as ‘She deserved it’,” says her mother Kim Devins. “Bianca was everything they hated. She was a really smart girl, very pretty; a lot of guys liked her. She was also intuitive and aware. She recognized grooming in her online community and had helped a lot of girls get away from some dangerous situations.” Had she got this attention when she was alive surely she would have used it to warn others, but sadly she missed the signs herself. We all crave to be liked, but like her, most of us are happy to expose ourselves to others we don’t know. Innocent normal behavior right? Well it should be, but it’s also about what happened after she was killed that triggered the song. One of the last “brag” posts her killer made was “You’re going to have to find someone else to orbit you fuckers” This was the seed that started "Playing with the Orbits" There is plenty on-line if you want to dig deeper and so no need for me to say more except read the lyrics and hear Holly’s performance, the story is there. So have we crossed the line from what makes something Gothic? What does that mean anyway. Is it the subject matter, look or the sound? Velatine is like a modern extension of the first Gothic wave, a term even they didn’t like. Their sound and look was really just displaying who they were, what they loved, a fascination with death and the beauty of the old, the dress, literature, architecture, attributes mainstream music misses by a mile. They filled that gaping hole. Velatine is no different and it’s the gothic / darkwave music fans who are going to be most receptive to what we do. It’s a modern necessity to be labeled, to be classified as this genre or that. That first wave was fighting against a lot of things, they were anti-establishment but wanted to make music that contained depth, music that was dark, compassionate, beautiful, mysterious and often melodic. We do no different Gothic or not, one thing is for sure, Playing With the Orbits takes dark subject matter and I hope it is treated with respect. Underneath, it’s dark, a message from the grave. Loki Lockwood So think about what you expose of yourself online and to who. ‪@velatine‬ *some [re-worked/edited] content appeared in The Guardian written by Anna Moore, a UK journalist].