17 hours of not knowing if you're gonna make it out of the wilderness or not gave Evenson a lot to think about. That brush with Death in the Flatirons with his friends strengthened the resolve of a once-budding musician to turn him into the full-fledged rising artist and viral sensation that we have with us today. The chilling experience must have put a lot of things into perspective and has certainly given him a lot of wisdom and strength of character that he imbues his music with.
Evenson's music is really good at getting close to you, like a good long-time friend who knows just what to say because they know you so well, this is probably because of the strong Bedroom-pop foundation that makes his sound (but especially his lyrics) take on emotionally intimate capabilities that effortlessly pass through your defenses. He is ever the masterful embodiment of the healer archetype in music, always arriving at your ears with melodic tenderness and understanding. Evenson's "Devil Inside" is not nearly as threateningly dark as its name suggests, instead, the track is a rather wistful-yet-blissful pop anthem bathed in shimmering synthpop waters that evoke a happily nostalgic feeling without falling into the framework of "retro" or "revival, being instead its own fresh new thing, and when comparing it to some of his previous tracks, it feels as though he's now adopting a wider soundscape that's even more conducive to uplifting the listener by saying "Quiet down the anxious part of yourself, listen up, it's all going to be Ok." Daily life can feel like a balancing act of the internal and external worlds, or rather between the past and the present, the struggles we carry within can take up quite a bit of our capacity to deal with the new struggles that come from without, but we're neither alone nor unique in this condition, and learning to take the moments of respite as they come is one of the most powerful tools that we have, this is ultimately what "Devil Inside" is trying to say. We all have a "devil" challenging us every day. "It's a song that encapsulates the feeling of bliss, as well as learning to live with the 'devil's' that affect us every day,” Says Evenson himself “Whether it’s a bad breakup, depression, or even isolation, the 'devil' can represent any form of a demon that the listener is living with. My hope is that the listener can enter a temporary state of bliss while listening, and come out on the other side feeling lighter and more optimistic.” And indeed optimistic, it's hard not to when the synths and vocals act together like a rising thermal draft under the wings of imagination, taking on trippy qualities that offer a very colorful near-psychedelic experience that is true to Evenson's goal of making "three minutes of an auditory form of ego death" in the form of a glorious indie pop track.
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