“A project to listen to with your eyes closed”: ROREY on her upcoming EP ‘Dysphoria’ 

Rorey, a singer-songwriter from New York, has “always been inclined towards music”, picking up the “guitar at six” years old, and “professionally making music at 19/20”. She released her first single in 2021, her debut EP Apt 7D, in 2023, and despite navigating music being a “long weird journey of finding the right people and myself as a person”, she is releasing her long-awaited sophomore EP Dysphoria on 15 August. 
 
Dysphoria has been in the works for years, with lyrics being written and demos being recorded when she was only 21 years old – prior to the release of Apt 7D. Contrastingly to Apt 7D, which has a 2000s-inspired grunge-pop feeling with tracks such as ‘Mirror’ and ‘Sit w it’, Rorey describes Dysphoria as increasingly ‘interpersonal’. She reveals that the songs on the EP were “written in a string of manic episodes” following being “diagnosed with bipolar”.

The tracks possess what Rorey prescribed as a “sense of chaos”. The most recent single ‘Wish I Was Numb’ demonstrates this perfectly, with the lyrics drawing upon Rorey’s experience in a “mixed affective state” in which she felt “manic and depressed at the same time”. This is reflected sonically with the track balancing sounds of “vulnerability and dance”. 

The EP is ‘designed for headphones’ – ‘a project to listen to with your eyes closed’ – to better feel the music moving around you

The EP will also feature singles released in 2024: ‘Standby’, ‘Sleepwalking’, and ‘Soho Grand’, alongside recently released tracks ‘Nobody’s Fault But My Own’ and the aforementioned ‘Wish I Was Numb’. The tracks, while all distinct, remain cohesive with a “blend of lots of guitars” and “ethereal vocals”. In the studio, with the songs having sat in her “notes app as demos”, there was a focus on “building the sonic narrative” which was achieved with “lots of panning”. The EP is “designed for headphones” – “a project to listen to with your eyes closed” – to better feel the music moving around you.

Rorey confesses that Dysphoria “wasn’t supposed to be a project”, but once approached with the realisation that thematically the demos centred on deeply personal experiences she realised “I want to tell my story”. The lyrics, similarly to tracks on Apt 7D, are “always drawn on personal experience”, and after being “sat there for year, untouched”, Rorey cites the experience of releasing them and “talking about my diagnosis” as “liberating”, as it ultimately “really helped me not judge myself”.

The songs feel like diary entries in tandem with gorgeous instrumental progressions. In ‘Nobody’s Fault But My Own’, lyrics such as ‘Cry with the lights one / I can’t hide / I can’t lie’ represent tangible memories and experiences. This is similarly demonstrated by one of Rorey’s favourite lyrics in the EP’s concluding track, ‘Not The Way It Works’: ‘People can talk and talk / Somehow they say nothing at all’.
 
Beyond experiences and memories, feelings and thoughts are laced throughout every song. In ‘Soho Grand’ Rorey sings ‘I don’t feel like me now’, and repeats the question ‘Does it get better’ signifying ruminating feelings of dissociation and hope. In ‘Standby’, the lyrics are incredibly direct: ‘I feel insane’, ‘I’m dying on the inside’. This direct confrontation with feelings is a blunt representation of vulnerability. They portray a unsugar-coated experience, centring the raw feelings.

Rorey’s Dysphoria is to be released on 15 August: “I hope that people listen to it in its entirety”

Rorey mentioned one of the unreleased tracks featuring on the Dysphoria – ‘Hurts Me To Hate You’ – and described it as the “most impactful song on the project”. She confessed that it centres on “my relationship with my mum”. It remains intriguing to how Rorey will sonically portray the sensitive nature of this subject, but we can trust that the lyrics will be an honest and transparent portrayal of Rorey’s experience.  
 
A project that “never felt ready or felt like it was the right time to release”, being released now feels ‘surreal’ for Rorey as she is “letting go of something I was sitting with for years”. Focusing on her experience with bipolar, Rorey believes it to be some form of “divine timing” as the EP comes out after her “first episode in four years”. She is able to “tell my story” with only “months of distance” from the source material. 
 
Co-produced and co-written by Scott Effman, mixed by Nathan Phillips, and mastered by Brian Calhoon, Rorey’s Dysphoria is to be released on 15 August: “I hope that people listen to it in its entirety.”