Once you’ve told someone, "I don’t want to let you down," there’s really no going back, is there? You know that you have or that you soon will, that something irrevocable has already come to pass. When Sharon Van Etten released 2014’s Are We There, she talked about the imperiled 10-year relationship it documented in the present tense—though lines like "burn my skin so I can’t feel you" didn’t offer much hope for its recovery. In a recent NPR discussion about her new EP, the 34-year-old songwriter said of its subject, "It’s someone I still care about but don’t speak with any more." I Don’t Want to Let You Down comes from the Are We There sessions, but contains few of that record’s naked declarations: I love you but I’m lost. Your love is killing me. Nothing will change. Whether by design or just the nature of album off-cuts, these four songs (plus a live rendition of "Tell Me", from the Tramp era) are messier things that fit the unclean nature of long-term severance.
For Van Etten to tell NPR, "I’m not very good at communicating my emotions," might seem like a huge joke: few singer-songwriters have cut to the quick as brutally as she has over her four studio albums. But processing feelings on paper is different than knowing what to say to someone’s face. "I Don’t Want to Let You Down" zooms into that moment of pause before you hurt someone with hasty words: "Decompress and calm your head/ Teach you not to rush/ Turn them out, to see your words/ Trust me, stay and stay." Despite all her best intentions, the accusations of abandonment and betrayal come fast on "Just Like Blood". At the start, her verses about drowning and reaching are blurred and hard to pick out, but over trembling church organ and warm strings, she reaches a defiant, unequivocal peak.
Van Etten has never been shy about letting listeners hear her works-in-progress—the bonus reissue of Tramp came with the entire album in demo form, and there’s no end of rarities and alternate versions of her songs around for those who care to look. This EP was released to herald her inaugural South American tour, and contains songs that didn't make Are We There. Obviously, it’s not her strongest work. The title track is a bit of a thrumming plodder, and the choruses often repeat a single phrase. Her knack for expressive, muscular phrasing pushes them into interesting, sometimes challenging places, but they feel a little unrefined. However, "I Always Fall Apart" is a gorgeous piano ballad that was likely left off Are We There in place of the equally Leonard Cohen-like "I Love You But I’m Lost", but which works as a proud coda to its counterpart’s anxious panic. "It’s not my fault," she sings of the way she falls to pieces. "It’s just my flaw/ It’s who I am."
I Don’t Want to Let You Down may be a stopgap release, but there’s a crucial moment in Van Etten’s songwriting nestled towards the end. "Pay My Debts" is one of her classic slow-burns, but with an unusually grave synthetic palette. On Tramp, she repeatedly begged that someone take her seriously, trying to convince them—and probably herself in turn—of the self-assured woman behind her words. Van Etten has been frank about the fact that she ultimately chose her career over her relationship, and on "Pay My Debts", in a calm moment amidst the turmoil, she claims the only thing worth keeping from the aftermath: "I know myself better than you do."
