On the 8th of April this year, new up and coming acoustic pop artist REID made his debut into the music scene with his brand new single ‘Savannah’. Branching out from his usual style, ‘Savannah’ incorporates a more R&B-pop sound drawing inspiration from 808 beats and pulling sounds from Spanish Flamenco music.

Regarding the track, REID shared “for ages, I’ve always written songs about situations that have happened to me personally, but for Savannah, I just wanted to make an upbeat fun song not necessarily about anyone but more of a universal experience that other people could relate to.”

Inspired by Allen Stone, John Mayor and Jeremy Zucker, REID has the ability to fuse together genres and catchy lyrics to create a new, unique sound.

‘Savannah’ was written originally as part of a self-set challenge that REID partook in over the course of the Covid lockdown. “I started this little songwriting challenge just for myself when in isolation, and the aim was to try to write a new song each day.”

REID’s creative process when writing music changes every time, and often inspiration sparks after humming a catchy melody and thinking “ooh, that could be something”. Generally, his initial process focuses on instrumentation, only later coming up with lyrics to fit around the music and match the pre-established sound.  The process for creating ‘Savannah’ was very similar; “I started with just the guitar chords and then decided to incorporate a sort of Spanish vibe into it.”

‘Savannah’ is available on all major music streaming platforms (Spotify, Apple Music, SoundCloud and Bandcamp).

About REID – Based in Wellington, New Zealand, REID was introduced to music at a young age; “My whole family’s musical – Dad bought me a guitar when I was 10 and he taught me a few chords and it kind of just sparked from there.” Growing up, REID was inspired largely by artists like Ed Sheeran, which is evident in the acoustic-pop sound that his songs typically encapsulate. He infuses upbeat pop with simple, relatable lyrics with the intent of getting people to sing and dance along. Towards the end of high school was when REID realised that he wanted to turn his passion for singing and songwriting into a career, and so travelled to Wellington to study performance music. In terms of where he sees himself headed in the future, REID shares “My ultimate goal would be to put New Zealand on the map as a place where largely successful artists can come out of because that has been pretty rare in the past.”