There is a kind of quiet that feels radical in late 2025. Music culture, particularly around the holidays, tends to reward scale and spectacle. Songs swell, feelings peak, and emotions are often engineered to arrive all at once. SIESKI’s new single “Close” moves in the opposite direction. It does not rush. It does not resolve anything loudly. Instead, it sits with the listener, offering presence rather than catharsis.
Released on December 5, “Close” is built around live piano and cello, recorded in a single room at Helm Studios in Vancouver. The arrangement is spare but not fragile. It carries weight through restraint, allowing breath, silence, and physical space to do as much work as melody. The song feels less like a statement than an invitation, one that asks listeners to slow their bodies down long enough to notice what steadiness can feel like. “I always knew it needed to stay soft,” SIESKI says. “I intentionally wrote it as a gentle recording, something that pulls you in without rushing, that simply lands and flows. I wanted it to mirror the feeling of a reciprocal relationship, unforced, steady, and spacious, where nothing needs to be heightened to be meaningful.”
That intention runs counter to how intimacy is often portrayed in pop music. Love is typically framed as overwhelming or destabilizing, something that arrives like a storm or leaves like an emergency. “Close” refuses that arc. Its emotional center is not urgency, but consistency. It is a song about being held in place rather than swept away.
The physicality of the recording is immediately noticeable. You can hear the room. You can sense the distance between instruments, the air moving between notes. SIESKI remembers that session clearly. “I was in a small room playing piano and singing, and through the window I could see Emilio Suarez on cello,” she says. “We recorded everything live, which was really important to me. I wanted it to feel like the piano and cello were in conversation with each other. That back-and-forth is what gives the song its emotional presence.”
There is something deeply human about that image. Two musicians separated by glass, listening and responding in real time, trusting each other to leave space. It mirrors the song’s thematic core. “Close” is not about possession or intensity. It is about mutual attentiveness, about staying present without performing closeness.
The lyric that anchors the song, “the world doesn’t feel as dark when you are brightening it up,” arrives without ornamentation. It is plainspoken and almost disarming in its simplicity. Asked where it came from, SIESKI resists the idea of conscious construction. “That line, and really the whole song, came through very organically,” she says. “I often feel like my songs write themselves, and I’m just an open vessel for them.”
She traces the song back to a specific relationship, but avoids romanticizing it. “I was thinking about a relationship in my life that held a lot of softness, a space where emotions could exist without pressure,” she explains. “Rather than love feeling conditional, intense, or avoidant, this kind of love felt slow, supportive, and consistent. That line captures how grounding that presence felt.”
SIESKI’s background in theatre shapes how she thinks about timing and stillness. “Close” is attentive to when to speak and when to pause, when to let silence carry meaning. That sensibility feels increasingly rare in contemporary pop, where space is often filled reflexively. For SIESKI, restraint is not absence but intention.
“Breathing is something we do instinctively, but it’s also the most essential tool in voice, expression, and performance,” she says. “As an anxious and highly sensitive person, I really cherish spaciousness. Finding grounding in breath and stillness, and noticing sensation without urgency or judgment. Writing songs has always been a way for me to regulate and make sense of my emotions.”
That idea of music as regulation, rather than release, reframes how vulnerability operates in her work. Vulnerability is not about exposure for its own sake, but about creating conditions where emotions can exist safely. “I love singing across styles,” she adds, “but I’m especially drawn to moments of vulnerability and restraint, where silence carries just as much meaning as sound.”
Earlier in her catalog, SIESKI has explored much louder forms of expression. Tracks like “Lady Deity,” her queer-femme anthem featured in the Vizzybility Project curated by Canada’s Drag Race winner Priyanka, are declarative and expansive. They claim space. “Close” does not retreat from that identity, but it approaches it from a different angle.
“When I think about production, I always start with the song’s emotional message, its concept, its energy, its body,” she explains. “I try to honor where the song wants to live sonically rather than forcing it into a format.” That curiosity has allowed her to move fluidly between worlds. From FACTOR-funded visuals like “Scale Model” to appearances on CTV’s etalk, CBC Music, and Telus Optik TV’s Dandyland series, her work resists being flattened into a single narrative. There is theatricality, but also intimacy. There is play, but also restraint.
Comparisons inevitably follow. Critics and listeners often reach for reference points like Beth Orton or Magdalena Bay when describing her sound. SIESKI does not bristle at those parallels. “I actually love those comparisons,” she says. “At the same time, it’s always hard to fully compare artists.”
She situates herself within those lineages thoughtfully. “I resonate with Beth Orton and Esthero in terms of an earthy, folk-leaning vocal delivery,” she explains. “While Magdalena Bay inspires me aesthetically, their playful power and intricate production. I’m really interested in creating theatrical, avant-pop worlds that hold both depth and play.”
That interest is particularly present in her live performances, where theatrical instincts can fully surface. Rather than diluting her identity, genre fluidity becomes a way to reflect the complexity of lived experience. “It’s mostly a result of following emotion,” she says of her genre-defying approach. “But my theatre training plays a role too. I’ve always loved embodying different characters and pushing concepts to their extremes.” She sees no contradiction between softness and spectacle. “Some songs live in a soft, earnest place while others explore a more playful, faerie-like world,” she says. “It reflects how I experience being human. We carry the full spectrum, and I want my music to honor that complexity.”
Releasing “Close” during the holidays was not an afterthought. It was a deliberate decision shaped by how she understands that season emotionally. “The holidays amplify everything,” she says. “Closeness, absence, longing, obligation, nostalgia. People are either surrounded by loved ones or deeply missing them.” Rather than leaning into traditional holiday tropes, she wanted to create something adjacent. “I wanted to offer something sweet and sentimental,” she explains. “Not a Christmas song, but something you could slip into a jazzy holiday playlist.”
That positioning matters. “Close” holds space for contradiction. “The song holds both the ache of distance and the comfort of connection,” she says. “Since people are already in their feelings during this time, it felt like the right moment to release this song.”
Looking ahead, SIESKI describes an artistic process that feels both more confident and more complex. “What feels easier is trusting my voice and expression,” she says. “What started as a very introspective process has opened into more play and exploration.” At the same time, possibility brings its own challenges. “What feels harder is choosing direction in production,” she admits. “There are so many possibilities now. But I’ve really been enjoying finding nuance in form and shaping music that feels distinctly and unapologetically mine.”
Featured Images: Lia Hansen Photo
