Siobhan Lynch – or Baba Music, when she’s performing – is keen to be an icon for social change, and that filters through to her music. Self-examining but also socially conscious, she writes music that reflects where her heart sits, and explores her impact on the world, and the world’s impact on her.
In new single ‘Keep You Safe’, for example, Lynch reflects on the vulnerable and how she can be there for them, pouring her beliefs into the words she delivers.
“‘And they try to shame the skin you’re in, until you shed. Black, white, fat, trans, perfect 10, they’re afraid’… I love these lyrics from the new track ‘Keep You Safe’,” Lynch tells me. They came to me really quickly after writing the melody.”
“As a woman I have found you have to fight and fight to be heard and listened to. We are always too fat, too skinny, too loud, too quiet. The list goes on. So for me, accepting that this might be a fact of life gave me a certain freedom, I could let myself off the hook a little, everything wasn’t always my fault. Unfortunately it is a way of the world, not to say that it’s right or should be tolerated but to think in those terms, makes it easier to keep fighting to be heard…”
It’s not just the single that will reflect these beliefs. As Lynch moves forward – both back towards performing live, and with the production of a record she hopes might appear some time next year – she will continue to address her own realities deeply within her music.
“I find it difficult to write about anything that hasn’t affected me, everything I write about are things I’ve heard, seen or felt.” Lynch says. “I am an extremely curious person, I go to counselling once a week and I love finding out about what makes me feel a certain way, or why I might behave or react in a certain way and that really helps my writing.”
