Hana Vu mourns her youth in new album 'Romanticism'
After the release of her first studio album ‘Public Storage’ made waves back in 2021, self-made indie artist Hana Vu has returned with a long-awaited new project via Ghostly International. Continuing her collaboration with co-producer and multi-instrumentalist Jackson Phillips, Hana Vu delivers her second studio album Romanticism, a 12-track project crafting a modern mix of guitar-heavy indie rock and synth-pop.
Photo by Andrew Yuyi Truong
The album serves as a time capsule of the transition from adolescence into adulthood, capturing the fragile emotions that accompany this stage of life. However, Romanticism is not your typical coming-of-age narrative filled with heartbreak, self-discovery, and the excitement of stepping into personal freedom. Instead, Vu opens up a conversation about the grief and nostalgia associated with leaving behind one’s youth and naivete. A journey everyone goes through, yet a feeling uncomfortable to sit with and perhaps not confronted enough.
The album’s title is a nod to the European artistic movement of the 1700s, which emphasized heightened emotion and sensory details. For Vu, this means creating a space where big feelings are not only acknowledged but embraced wholeheartedly as the album invites listeners to embrace vulnerability, sadness, and grief of self.
The opening track, “Look Alive” dives straight into this loss of self. Backed up with slow yet epic synths, her voice takes up most of the space, leaving the listener no choice but to fully focus on imprinting lines like “there’s no air in my lungs/ cause my breath has changed/ and now I’m a ghost of who I have been” - a confession that hits like a hammer and taps right into the feelings you're about to indulge in with the songs yet to come.
The following two tracks, “Hammer” and “Alone,” tick off every box of what makes good indie-rock: layered guitars, dynamic build-up, powerful percussion, and energy-releasing choruses. Vu’s vocals are plagued by exhaustion and desperation, capturing the struggle for answers amid inner turmoil. Where “Hammer” expresses the urge to “run away till it's all behind” because she can’t physically sit with her overwhelming emotions, “Alone” is the perfect song to listen to when you actually start running - brimming with energy and heightened emotions.
“22” maintains this energy. It feels like a cry for her past self. She is worn out as she describes the paradox of being young yet feeling old: “I’m just getting old; I’m just 22”. Now being 24, it would be interesting to have a follow up to this song. Your early 20s are filled with so much change; every year feels like a new chapter of yourself. Does she still feel haunted by the passing of time now? Would she even “Care” now?
In “Care”, big questions and an undertone of existential angst are packed into a 4:38 minute runtime. However, Vu’s captivating storytelling makes you lose your sense of time. Coming from the perspective of someone who seems to care too much, the story follows a contemplation of the question: “What is care anyway?” And that's also what Romanticism is: A catalog of big, existential questions and an honest reflection, that there simply are no answers to them. You can hear Vu’s resignation into giving into the way it goes, into “How It Goes”.
And it's almost like this realization of not having answers changed something within Vu herself, because “How It Goes” marks a change of tone. Musically and lyrically this song feels like resignation. Framed by a more folky sound, she surrenders, giving into the fight she was having with herself in the first half of the album.
“Dreams” then steps into a parallel world - a place where life flows effortlessly, unburdened by the constant flux of change: “and love doesn’t fade away/ and everyone stays the same / and no it doesn't hurt to be alive”. Accompanied by continuous harmonies an octave higher, this upbeat song adds an element of lightness to the album. If it were to be separated from the rest of the project, one could think it's an ode to life. Yet, upon closer inspection, it reveals itself to be an ode to a dream, a make-believe and most of all a longing. The title “Dreams” serves as a reality check: it does, indeed, hurt to be alive, love does fade away with time, and it's inevitable that people will change.
And should that not be enough to shake the listener out of the daydream, the starting line of “Find Me Under Wilted Trees” will do the job: “Welcome to your life/ it’s a big defeat” makes it clear that the dream presented in the previous song is over. Instead, a darker, edgy rock sound sets in, underlined by a spooky bass line. Now Vu is back to her reality, potentially even entering a nightmare as her voice is once again filled with desperation. And there is just something about Hana Vu repeatedly screaming “I don’t know” that makes you too question whether you yourself know anything.
The standout track, “Airplane,” circles back the nostalgia amidst the passage of time: “do you remember getting older?”. Here another prominent bass line adds speed and energy. The epic chorus is a highlight of this album; it makes for a strong contender to recreate the tunnel scene in Perks of Being A Wallflower (if you know, you know).
While most of the album arose out of introspective nature, placing the grief of youth in the center, the last few tracks draw on complexity as other people are entangled in this web of uncertainties and feelings of being lost. The refrain of “Play”: “All I play is you / oh every game I lose” suggests a pattern of having difficulty in sustaining relationships whilst still expressing a longing for connection. “I Draw A Heart” plays with the impermanence of relationships and love. You can feel the change of emotions and the loss of intimacy from line to line. From infatuation and hopefulness to disappointment and, ultimately, resignation. Vu lays bare, as the final heart she draws seems to mark an ending.
The closing track, “Love” concludes this. Being worn out both in love and in life and still struggling with being “sure of nothing at all”, she is leaving the chat singing, “I just keep it in thought / And keep it in song / Til it all goes away”. It’s final crescendo of momentum and big emotional turmoil, with a layer of rock elements as she screams her heart out one last time. Her “keeping it in song” is what we owe this album to, so thank you, Hana Vu, for pouring your all into this project.
Romanticism is a powerhouse of emotional transparency, not shying away from having no answers to life’s big questions. Vu captures what it feels like to be young and profoundly sad, grieving the fleeting nature of time in an indie rock album infused with some DIY influences from her roots. With a contemporary touch, she incorporates epic synths to build on the momentum of her voice, which is a true force and aims straight at the heart. She encourages listeners to face their feelings head-on and accept them in all of their overwhelming complexity.
Are you seeking a cathartic experience where you can belt out these songs and share a collective mourning of time’s passage with your closest friends? Catch Hana Vu live during her US tour this summer. Check out the dates here and follow her on Instagram and Spotify.