B-Side Guys

Geography becomes cruelty when love gets involved. Clare Perrott’s debut single “Philadelphia” strips folk tradition down to its essential elements—nylon guitar, vulnerable vocals, and the kind of story that makes you grateful you’re listening alone. The Boorloo-based alt-folk artist captures that specific grief that comes when physical distance forces emotional reckoning, transforming a city name into shorthand for inevitable loss.

Fresh from her Woodford Folk Festival appearance, Perrott demonstrates why traditional folk storytelling remains powerful when executed with genuine emotional investment. Her nylon guitar work creates intimate acoustic space while her “twangy emotive vocals” deliver the kind of raw honesty that makes commercial polish seem like betrayal. The arrangement refuses any comfort that might soften the song’s difficult truths.

The track succeeds as traditional folk narrative, presenting the story of losing someone to another city with the matter-of-fact devastation that defines the genre’s greatest moments. Perrott understands that folk ballads work best when they acknowledge bitter realities alongside beautiful melodies, creating space for the “hint of bitterness that comes with being human” without drowning in it.

Her vocal approach demonstrates impressive control over dynamic range, moving between yearning and resignation with the kind of precision that suggests deep familiarity with the emotions she’s describing. Rather than performing grief, she presents it as lived experience, making every line feel necessary rather than constructed.

What distinguishes “Philadelphia” from countless other distance-relationship songs is Perrott’s refusal to provide false hope or easy closure. She presents the permanent change that occurs when people choose geography over connection, acknowledging this choice without vilifying anyone involved. The song creates space for complex feelings about necessary endings.

With her live single launched at Clancy’s Fremantle on June 6th, “Philadelphia” establishes Perrott as an artist capable of honoring folk tradition while bringing contemporary emotional intelligence to age-old themes of love, loss, and geographical impossibility.