SamSeb Kierkegaard “Luna: Dependent Personality Disorder"

We’re glad to announce that Kent, United Kingdom-based dystopian alternative emo rock fantasy solo artist SamSeb Kierkegaard has released a new single, entitled “Luna: Dependent Personality Disorder.”

An alternative rock artist from South Korea, SamSeb Kierkegaard has always recorded and experimented with his sounds, shifting from a raw UK lockdown grunge/psychedelic influence on his first single, “Metamorphosis” (2020) to post-hardcore themes on his rendition of AURORA’s “Forgotten Love” (2021).

“Luna: The Invisible Irony” (December 2021) and “Luna: Luna Moonlight” (January 2022) served as a taster for the EP he’s been working on, deeply reflecting on his innermost dark thoughts drawn from the Luna saga he wrote. Sam expanded not just with a wider audience, but also with different sounds of post-hardcore and shoegaze that nicely fit in the libraries of fans of artists such as My Chemical Romance, My Bloody Valentine and David Bowie for the dark and quirky aspects.

“Luna: The Invisible Irony” in particular gained attention from Mystic Sons, and to date has received 6.6k streams on Spotify as well as boosting monthly listeners from 30 to 3,824 at the highest. The song features a boy who wants to escape the city of Reality, finding a standalone door glowing in the dark, Uncertainty the Monster who’s constantly chasing him down, and a blonde-haired girl called Luna Moonlight who appears in the city of Dream and Happiness to rescue him.

Now, SamSeb Kierkegaard is continuing the tale of the boy on “Luna: Dependent Personality Disorder.” The third chapter to his upcoming EP project, the song is written from the perspective of the boy in denial of things happening around him, in pursuit of his illusory dreams and happiness that doesn’t exist in reality. Fictional story-based and character-based to represent the interpretation of us avoiding a psychologically uncomfortable truth, the track features sad and relatable lyrics with fierce guitar sounds and many experimental elements, like the reverse vocals in the intro.

“Luna: Dependent Personality Disorder’ is the third chapter of the Luna fantasy saga. The boy enters a never-ending paradoxical loop of returning back to the bridge under the same dystopian red sky. As the boy walks past the streets without end, he begins to question everything, inviting the sleep to forget about all the ever-present, humdrum repetition of tragedies in sight. He imagines himself to be looking at a girl desired so much and to be holding her hand, embracing the glorious magnificence of her presence. Then the boy realises that nothing happened and ends up passing out,” Sam says.

Elaborating further on the story and creative process behind “Luna: Dependent Personality Disorder,” Sam tells us:

“As far as the story goes, the boy is in denial of all the tragedies happening around him in this city of Dreams and Happiness. For example, the city that was once glorious in its magnificence and splendour is now no longer to be seen, but is being destroyed by our loathsome and gigantic monster, Uncertainty. The boy now thinks Luna Moonlight is a hypocrite just like all the other girls he met in the city of Reality, and he even tries to convince himself that the city of Dreams and Happiness which is now being burnt to ashes is a fake one. ‘Can’t you see they fooled me again with their flowery lies, I’m still climbing up the mountain of relentless rejection.’ Sadly, he still believes that somewhere out there exists a ‘true’ city of Dreams and Happiness and the ‘true’ Luna Moonlight. To continue the story, ‘The boy continued walking past the streets without end, without the end to the humdrum repetition of all the daunting and bleak buildings lined up endlessly in an orderly fashion to infinity. He moved his steps towards endlessly where he thought he was destined to go.’ This is where the boy realises that he is simply coming back to where he started- the bridge under which the red river flows under the sky that was eventually turning red of whose glorious grandeur never to be seen again. He believes that he just needs to sleep it off and let the dream invite him to a better world where only the boy and ‘true’ Luna Moonlight will be around with no pain and suffering present to haunt him.

Sadly, that doesn’t do anything. All he could see was nothing but the absence of the perfect dreamy girl he imagined, and the humdrum repetition of the bleak and daunting buildings lined up in an orderly fashion to infinity. And he screams ‘please someone help me! I deserve to be loved,’ which is what I tried to audibly picture in the intro section of the single, where I used reverse vocal to make the vocals sound grotesque in a way. It was by accident that I came up with that idea though, because the original vocal part before I reversed it was going to be the chorus initially, but I didn’t like it. If you reverse it you can hear ‘Your silence tears my ears apart. I can’t find you when I’m awake,’ which is again a reference back to him opening his eyes to see no glimpse of the girl.

I wanted to audibly represent what it means for someone to hold on to something that is so out of touch with the reality, and how that can damage someone emotionally, which can often end up stopping people from progressing in life. The song is the manifestation of ‘self-denial’ and ‘resentment’, depicted in a dreamy yet rather grotesque way.”

For listeners who are curious to learn more about the story, Sam adds, “Here’s the link to the background fictional story behind Luna A Fantasy Named Happiness Chapter 3, and feel free to give it a read if you’re interested in finding out the details! Also, we are almost there to the finale of Luna: A Fantasy Named Happiness EP saga. Stay tuned and find out yourself how the story ends x”

“Luna: Dependent Personality Disorder” immediately captures the listener’s attention with the song’s reverse vocals intro, underscored by a catchy electric guitar riff. The distorted guitar chords soon become clearer as the bass and drums enter; and as the first verse begins, the guitar takes on a clean yet no less dynamic sound that perfectly highlights Sam’s evocative vocal melodies, along with atmospheric synth echoes. During the choruses, the guitar is again characterized by a distorted texture, nicely highlighting the track’s compelling lyrics; and after the second chorus, abrasive guitar leads create a powerful effect that juxtaposes quite effectively with the muted, far-off sounding verse that follows. The chorus then repeats as Sam’s emotive vocal melodies are accompanied by an uplifting guitar chord progression, nicely concluding this excellent track.

“Luna: Dependent Personality Disorder” is quite an enjoyable listen throughout, showcasing SamSeb Kierkegaard’s brilliant songwriting and superb musicianship. I would highly recommend this track to alternative rock fans.

Follow SamSeb on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, SoundCloud, YouTube, and Spotify. You can also visit his official website. If you enjoy his music and are able to provide monetary support, you might consider downloading it on Bandcamp.

It also helps to stream and share his music; you can obviously find it in the following Playlists: Less Than 1,000 Followers, Fresh Singles, Alterindie State Of Mind, and Sickest & Dopest.

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