Feathered Thing

Emily Barker

A song about hope and resilience, amidst loss and sorrow.

Why I wrote this song

“Feathered Thing” is the third single from Emily’s album ‘Fragile as Humans’.

It explores themes of loss, grief, and finding hope and is inspired by Emily Dickinson’s poem ‘”Hope” is the thing with feathers’.

The metaphor of a “feathered thing” represent hope and resilience amidst sorrow.
It delves into the emotional journey of accepting loss, acknowledging the pain, and moving forward while cherishing memories.

About me as an artist

Emily Barker is the award-winning songwriter and performer of the theme to BBC TV’s Wallander starring Kenneth Branagh. Her music is an indie blend of influences from alt-country to folk via 60s pop, with comparisons ranging from PJ Harvey to Joni Mitchell.

As a teenager, Barker left Western Australia, with an acoustic guitar and a backpack, first arriving in England in the summer of 2000. She has previously written entire albums about longing for home, but her latest release Fragile as Humans was inspired and written in both hemispheres: during a writing residency in Stroud, while people-watching at London’s Kings Cross station and upon returning to WA following the state’s strict, pandemic-related border closures.

Her album Fragile as Humans takes us on a deep dive into the human condition, an unflinching self-examination of grief, pain, loneliness and loss, at the same time sparkling with hope, optimism and connection.

“If I could choose one word for people to hold in their minds as they listen to this album,” Barker muses, “that word would be: compassion.”

About the music video

‘Feathered Thing’ was shot in the studio and with Luke Potashnick (producer) on the Nashville tuning acoustic guitar & Richard Causon on the glockenspiel.