For most artists, momentum is something you chase. For Michellar, it is something she rebuilt from silence.
Based in San Francisco, Michellar’s return to songwriting after a forty year hiatus feels less like a comeback and more like a quiet insistence. There is no nostalgia act here, no attempt to relive an earlier chapter. Instead, she is writing forward, releasing music at a pace that suggests urgency, curiosity, and a refusal to second-guess instinct. In just nine months, she has released twenty two singles, each one stretching toward a different emotional or stylistic direction.
Her latest release, “Game of Love” featuring Rad Datsun, captures that spirit with deceptive ease. The song is understated, playful, and emotionally precise, built around a looping chord progression that recalls classic seventies songwriting without feeling trapped by it. It is a track about flirtation, timing, and the subtle negotiations that shape human connection. Like much of Michellar’s recent work, it sounds simple on the surface and quietly complex underneath.
The collaboration came together by chance, during a songwriting retreat in Idyllwild, California. Michellar describes the process with the kind of clarity that only comes from genuine creative alignment. “I met Brad at a songwriting retreat in Idylwild California. In the retreat, each day we were assigned to groups of 2 or 3 to collaborate on a song of our choice.At first, we sat down and talked about ideas on the setting and mood of the song. Brad had a looping track from his studio that we decided to use. After writing down many ideas, we decided that the song be set in a story of a flirtatious encounter in the Airport. The song Game of Love was born.”
That sense of immediacy is audible in the finished track. The lyrics unfold like overheard conversation, grounded in observation rather than confession. It is a song about possibility and restraint, about how intimacy can flare up briefly in transitional spaces. Airports are places where people are constantly arriving and leaving, emotionally and physically. Framing the song there allows “Game of Love” to hover between anticipation and detachment.
Michellar’s songwriting is deeply shaped by her musical lineage. She is open about her influences, and they show up not as imitation but as structure and restraint. “I am influenced by 70’s music of Carole King, The Bread, Crosby, Stills and Nash, the Doobie brothers and Fleetwood Mac just to name a few. With these influences, the track that the Fleetwood Mac has on one of their songs…. stirred us into the direction of a real simple 3 chord progression that looped. We used that 3 chord loop for a melody and then we wrote the story with the lyrics.”
Simplicity is intentional. The looping progression becomes a canvas, allowing the story to do the emotional work. It is a technique rooted in classic songwriting, where melody supports narrative rather than overwhelming it. Michellar’s voice sits comfortably within that tradition, measured and conversational, never forcing emotion where suggestion will do. What makes her current output remarkable is not just its volume, but the context behind it. For four decades, songwriting was absent from her life. Returning to it required discipline, vulnerability, and a willingness to relearn her own hands.
“Returning to Music after a 40 year hiatus was so joyful, and at the same time scary. I was so off touch with the guitar, I had to work really hard to get right back on it. I started with very simple chords and melodies and wrote lyrics I felt I needed to express. I wrote every day for 3 hours at night until I got used to it. In the beginning I always felt that I was going to lose that ability again…. So I pushed myself to write everyday. Until I had written 30 songs and I just kept going.”
That daily practice reshaped not just her technical ability but her creative philosophy. Writing became a form of trust rather than performance, an ongoing conversation rather than a finished statement. “Today….. I feel comfortable playing and writing even experimental at times. I write in every genre I can think of because I am curious about my sound and am want to venture into areas of music i’ve never gone before. To date, I have songs in country, pop, edm, latin, country gospel, christian, brazilian and psychedelia.”
Genre, for Michellar, is not a boundary but a question. Her output reflects an artist exploring what happens when instinct is allowed to lead. That openness is mirrored in her approach to collaboration, which is less about credentials and more about shared energy. “I look for a certain energy….that vibrates between my collaborator and I. This energy can be felt in our conversations. The candid expressions, the uninhibited comments, the body language are all indicators of that positive energy. When that energy is present……. There is constant flow to creating that perfect vibe.”
“Game of Love” is also shaped by its unusual production journey. The demos were recorded in San Francisco and Minneapolis, where Rad Datsun is based, before being sent to Romanian producer Marius Alexandru. The distance between collaborators could have fractured the song, but instead it deepened it. “The distance created a synergy that can be felt in the delivery of the final track…. Through the storytelling, vocals and production.”
Coordinating across time zones and schedules presented challenges, but communication became the glue holding the project together. “The challenges were our timelines and schedules…. Marius is in Romania while Brad is in Minneapolis so we couldnt get together all at once. But we manage to communicate well enough our vision for the song and the sound that we were looking for. Marius delivered a production so well composed to the vision we had.” That clarity of vision is evident in the final mix. The production never overwhelms the song’s emotional center. Instead, it reinforces it, creating a sense of cohesion that feels earned rather than polished into place.
Lyrically, “Game of Love” is rooted in shared experience rather than autobiography. Michellar and Rad Datsun approached the narrative through conversation, drawing from moments that felt universally recognizable. “Brad and I talked about experiences we both had being in an encounter in the airport and how that felt for us. These experiences help shape the narrative of the song.” This observational approach gives the track its quiet resonance. It does not demand identification, but it invites it. Listeners are free to project their own memories into the space the song creates.
Michellar’s prolific output might suggest restlessness, but she frames it instead as presence. Her songwriting sessions are less about control and more about openness. “I do not limit myself into one genre or style. I write what feels right during my songwriting session. These sessions are very similar to my abstract painting sessions where my mind is completely empty to be able to accept what comes to me at the time. There is a Japanese word for that …. Mushin.” That concept of Mushin, a state of no mind, aligns closely with how her music feels. There is little sense of calculation or trend-chasing. The songs arrive as they are, shaped by curiosity rather than expectation.
Looking ahead, Michellar is not interested in narrowing her focus. If anything, her ambitions are expanding toward heavier thematic territory. “I want to dive more into songs that carry global messages about War, Climate change, and the power of unity and connection. I also am looking into some psychedelic songs concepts of suicide, running away, and poisonous relationships such as domestic violence. I have written songs in these contexts, but I have yet found the right producer to help me carry the sound to the platforms. The genre is more Rock and since there is no high demand for those kinds of songs, producers are hard to come by.”
It is a striking admission in an industry that often rewards safe narratives. Michellar is aware of the limitations imposed by market demand, but she does not let that dictate her subject matter. Her work suggests an artist more interested in honesty than viability. At its core, “Game of Love” is about recognition. The recognition that love is rarely fair, rarely balanced, and rarely simple.
“Everyone has played the Game of Love… therefore there will always be a loser and a winner. Chances are even on both sides. I hope that many will experience it because it is what makes us all human.” This sentiment captures Michellar’s broader artistic philosophy. Her music does not promise resolution. It offers reflection. In a cultural moment obsessed with immediacy and outcome, her songs linger in the in-between spaces, where feeling outweighs certainty.
With “Game of Love,” Michellar continues to prove that reinvention does not require spectacle. Sometimes it simply requires listening closely to yourself, trusting the process, and letting the song arrive when it is ready.
Featured Image: Artist Supplied
