Delyn Grey’s Starkly Powerful “Battle” Dispenses With Platitudes and Bravado in Depicting Depression and Neurological Distress

DelynGrey_BATTLE2_crop — Delyn Grey, photo courtesy the artist

Delyn Grey’s “Battle” addresses one significant aspect of suffering from depression and other mental and neurological disorders and that’s the fact that you pretty much never just get over it. Even if you get through a bad phase of it it’s rarely if ever something that just goes away. You don’t “fix” it the way you might repair a faulty machine. It’s more complicated than that and the specifics are individual even if there are some similarities and resonances of experience. What Grey dares to express in the song is that you may never actually get completely past that struggle. With a dynamic, minor chord piano progression and passionate vocals the song depicts the frustrations, the confusion, the search for answers that may not be there and the ability to endure even if you don’t feel like you can. That can be a heavy message but it is a pop song, albeit a dark one offering no hopeful platitudes, and its power is offering a deep sense of understanding and empathy for going through those rough life passages. There are no faux posi words of encouragement and how it’ll all be okay. Rather, that one can weather some very bad times even if it does feel like things are completely unraveling inside your head. The song does not pander, no keep your chin up or anything like that. It’s sense of hope is given with acknowledging those feelings which so often feels like the only thing that doesn’t feel like some lie or “tough love” nonsense people parrot from a culture where vulnerability and being in a stretch of weakness or powerlessness is perversely seen as a moral failing. Delyn Grey dispenses with these meaningless, arbitrary culture tropes and extends her compassion and solidarity with a dose of what it’s like to be there in the worst places in your mind. Watch the music video on YouTube and connect with Grey at the links provided. Look out for Grey’s EP The Disappointment Girl due out later in 2020.