An African girl and the North Sea

The song Night Falls On The Town will be out on August 5, in memory of Jessica Phiri. Some of you may remember, there was a tragic accident on the beach here last year. Jessica Phiri from Zambia, fell into a rip current and lost her life, just 20 years old. She had been a guest with a German family, while working there for a year, through an international exchange program. It happened on a day trip to Zandvoort, at the end of Jessica’s stay. She wanted to see a sea. Zambia only has rivers.

She was missing for three days at the peak of summer and tourism just kept going as if nothing had happened. Albeit inevitable in a sense, it felt wrong to me. One of those late evenings I walked on the boulevard when all the tourists had gone home. I was surrounded by silent witnesses of tourism. Empty chairs, an abandoned fairground, the lifeboat had returned to the boathouse, but Jessica was still missing. I wrote the song Night Falls On The Town about it.  When the Phiri family and host family visited Zandvoort in June, to look for answers, I had the chance to present it to them. I hoped it might show them the events had had impact on the community here.

The song is available now on Bandcamp and precedes the release of my new album, expected in november.