“You left the keys right in the door / All of your shoe steps on the floor / And I could still see you / I took a chance and called your name / Knowing you wouldn’t hear a thing / You heard nothing.”
Toronto, ON multilingual singer-songwriter Ava Kay released her stunning new single, “Go,” just a couple of weeks ago, and returns today with an accompanying music video that is an equally visual delight. A previously unreleased track, Ava co-wrote this song with producer and fellow composer Craig McConnell back in 2017 for a music library company, but feels that it now deserves an official release due to the overwhelming response from fans who discovered it through some key movie soundtrack placements (appearing in the Hong-Kong romantic comedy, “Finding Mr. Right 2,” and the Hallmark movie, “Very, Very, Valentine”).
Born and raised in Toronto to parents who had emigrated to Canada from Palestine, Ava was encouraged musically at an early age, but always with the caveat that she should be pragmatic about the future. And while “Go” has all the elements of a highly personal breakup song, for Ava, the story happens to be much deeper than that. “It’s about leaving, but not just leaving because you’re fed up with something, but because taking the next step in your life is required,” she shares. “And, although it’s personal for me, it’s written from the perspective of a good friend writing to someone and saying, ‘you have to move on.’ It could be about any kind of parting.”
Ava teamed up with award-winning writer, director, and producer Reem Morsi (“The Door”, “Hysteria”) to create this sweet story surrounding two people very much in love, even in the end. “I wanted to make a mini-film versus a traditional artist performance video, [and] with that, comes the challenge of finding really expressive actors with there being no dialogue,” Ava explains. “I also didn’t want any scenes of anger or fighting, so one of our biggest challenges was to find two great actors who could pull off the delicate balance. Thankfully we did, and they were incredible.”
“For me, Go is about our struggle to let go of what we love, the familiar, to fulfill a dream we’re driven towards, a passion that consumes us, or to let go of a love that causes us strife, heartbreaking as it is,” adds Reem. “This video is a short film about seeking what we need to grow and experience life versus holding on to something that eventually holds us back, no matter how much we’re attached to it. We must go and experience our destiny.”
“And you take a few steps til you can run / But hesitating now would be wrong / So just go / And you could stay here and wait it out / Or figure out tomorrow, right now / So just go.”
“This song [is] about moving on and moving forward, leaving home for the first time, chasing your dreams, leaving a town, leaving a relationship or a life behind,” Ava adds in closing. “These lyrics are speaking directly to the doubts people have when they make these hard decisions and breaking through those doubts so they don’t hold you back.”
Photo Credit: Philippe Maurice
The British guy that crossed the ocean and crash landed in central Pennsylvania (to quote Greg Keelor, “And I wonder what am I doing here?”). As the youngest of four siblings, exposure to music from a very early age nurtured my passion and appreciation for many musical genres. Continuing to discover some amazingly diverse and talented musicians based in Canada, I gravitate to live music experiences and remain devoted to spreading the word about such a vibrant music scene.
