Single of the Week: Lighthouse - GRL / Silvertop Ash

In September 2014, Simone Battle of GRL took her own life. She was a wonderfully talented singer and her suicide left four devastated band mates. Taking a few months off to deal with the loss, the girls have reunited to record this beautiful track, a tribute to Battle. It's a simple acoustic guitar driven pop track that again highlights the vocals of the girls. It's a shame that when you listen to the track and listen to their past work, their vocal mix really misses Battle.

Lyrically this is a touching track, 'When the night gets cold and the lights go out. The sun is down, you're high in the clouds. When you feel lost, then I'll reach out to guide you home with my Lighthouse'. Beautiful sentiment and a fitting tribute to Simone Battle.

GRL haven't exactly set the charts alight, Australia and New Zealand being the only place they've had a top ten hit. Let's hope the girls are able to refocus and attain the success they greatly deserve.

This seemed a fitting song of the week. For anyone who reads my blog and don't know what I do outside of loving pop music, I am an independent theatre writer and producer. This week my critically acclaimed play, "Silvertop Ash" opens at Gasworks in Melbourne. This is a play about gay teen suicide in rural Australia. I simply just wanted to add my writer's note from the program to the post:

I wrote this play in 2007 when gay teen suicide in rural Australia was being featured in the news. It was estimated that 1 in 3 teen suicides was sexuality based, the number was higher in the country. This shocked me at the time, so I wrote the play. We come to 2015 and the problem still exists, but the coverage has ceased. There is no media coverage of teen suicide and because it seems more acceptable to be gay today, people forget the struggle that still exists for many people coming out. Suicide still happens, and we need to start the conversation again. Rural teens need to know suicide is not the answer, and that as Dan Savage says, “it gets better”. Thank for supporting this show.

If you're in Melbourne, I'd love you to come see the show.

Tickets: www.gasworks.org.au