This is a song that deserves as many ears as it can reach.
From the opening guitar, slipping and sliding in like a George Harrison B-side, nineteen year old Johanna Dadap already knows how to make a classic. “The World’s Gone Up In Smoke” is my pick for song of the week… give it a listen below!
“She’s too young to die.”
There is a lot of emotion in the song, and while a story is certainly told, the feeling of spiritually moving forward is at the root of this piece. “Is it something that I said or something that you did or has the world gone crazy like we knew that it always would?” is conversational in a questioning tone, and Johanna?She’s tearing into the glory of being alive despite knowing the expected outcome. Pain is no longer an element to fear but an all too reoccurring formality as the singer gets older.
Johanna lends her sublime vocals and acoustic guitar skills to the track, while the additional instrumentation and production is provided by Paul ‘Taffy’ White. “No one hears a word until the world goes up in smoke,” coaxed behind that 2017 Kanye auto-humming, is truly inspiring. Dadap has a certain warmth in her voice even when talking about rough ‘n’ tough topics. The elephant imagery is great and the song becomes a focused rant by the end of it all.
Pitting reverberated guitar lines against a building piano, Johanna sings about growing up in a time where the writings on the wall of her life become realized fact or anxiety-riddled fiction. Yet, like the song says, no one hears a word… which is a terrific irony for such a somber visualize-your-last-breath track.
It should be noted that despite being over five minutes long, unlike a lot of George Harrison’s work, “The World’s Gone Up In Smoke” flies by more and more I listen. And hey, I’m on my eighteenth play or so. I suggest you take the time to follow this artist and give yourself a moment to check the rest of her music out before the world goes up in a blaze of her well-written folk pop.
