After a decade known to many as POESY, the revered singer-songwriter is closing the door on her former identity and beginning a new chapter as Serra Marinheiro, a name that arrives alongside her final POESY single, ‘cataracts’.
The transition marks a deeply personal turning point for the star, whose career has included releases such as ‘Soldier of Love’ and the Big Machine Records EP ‘Glass Box Confessional’. For Serra, however, POESY had increasingly begun to feel like “living in disguise,” with years of small compromises ultimately leaving her feeling disconnected from who she really was.
Serra Marinheiro represents an opportunity to step fully into that identity – embracing both her confidence and determination, as well as her vulnerabilities. “This music is the anger in my gums and the moment I finally dared to stick around long enough to say to someone, ‘You see me’,” she says. “POESY was a girl afraid to disturb the universe, Serra Marinheiro is the woman ready to let you hear the scream.”
The new name is also a direct connection to her heritage. Serra comes from the Portuguese village where her family originated, while Marinheiro was the name of her grandfather’s restaurant, itself a tribute to the sailors of the local area.
The transformation arrives with ‘cataracts’, the final release under the POESY name and the first glimpse of what’s ahead. Built around sparse, piano-led production, the track gradually intensifies beneath Serra’s powerful vocal, matching its lyrical focus on finally confronting the things we have been unwilling – or unable – to see.
“I wrote ‘cataracts’ for anyone who’s ever been painfully blind to a situation because they were too busy forcing themselves to see the glass half full,” she explains. “That’s why it felt like the perfect final word from POESY – to finally close this chapter of doubting myself.”
Written and produced alongside Matt Ingram, whose credits include Florence + The Machine and Laura Marling, ‘cataracts’ serves as both an ending and a beginning. And while POESY’s story comes to a close, Serra Marinheiro’s is only just getting started, with more new music already waiting in the wings.
Download / stream ‘cataracts’ here.
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