Blondage Return From a Six-Year Silence to Confront Impostor Syndrome on “Phony”

Six years is a long time in pop music. It is an even longer time when, somewhere in between, you have two children, step away from the machinery of the industry and emerge with an entirely different understanding of why you want to make music in the first place.

For Danish alternative-pop duo Blondage, however, the time away never quite meant an ending.

Comprised of Pernille Smith-Sivertsen and Esben Nørskov Andersen, Blondage first established themselves in the 2010s through a seductive, experimental approach to electronic pop. Songs including “Dive,” “BOSS” and “Stoned” brought the Copenhagen duo international attention and took them around the world before life gradually pulled them elsewhere. They started a family together, but the musical language they had developed between them never disappeared.

Now Blondage return with “Phony,” their first new music in more than six years and the beginning of what promises to be a much larger creative chapter.

Restless and deliberately disorienting, “Phony” turns impostor syndrome into both subject matter and sonic architecture. Acoustic intimacy collides with hyperpop impulses and cinematic production; Pernille’s vocals continually change shape; moments of apparent confidence give way to something considerably more insecure underneath.

At its center is a particularly contemporary contradiction: we are encouraged to constantly construct, promote and narrate ourselves while simultaneously becoming terrified that somebody might discover the person behind the performance is simply ordinary. Blondage approach that anxiety not only as a personal insecurity, but as something symptomatic of a culture increasingly built around self-presentation.

For two musicians who describe social media as “cigarettes for our soul,” returning to an industry even more consumed by online identity than the one they stepped away from presents its own irony. But “Phony” also finds them operating from a radically different place. Parenthood has rearranged their priorities, limited their time and, paradoxically, made creating together feel more valuable than ever.

And after six years away, they have plenty to say.

It’s been six years since we last heard from Blondage. How has the landscape of the band changed for you both in that time, and what was the catalyst for returning now with “Phony”?

What does having two kids in a very short span do to a landscape? It’s like a wildfire sweeping through a forest: everything is burned down, but then new shoots start growing, and before you know it, a landscape that is even more lush and full of life appears.

It feels like we’re living on a whole different planet now, but a planet we much prefer to inhabit. The two of us are closer than ever before, and making music together is a blast. Every moment we get to work on music feels like a gift, not a chore. It’s an incredible thing to be able to share while also raising two wild horses together.

“Phony” feels transitional, and a way to sort of shed the last remnants of our past selves, back when you had all the time in the world to think about yourself.

“Phony” deals explicitly with the feeling of impostor syndrome. Was this a theme that emerged naturally during the writing process, or was it something you set out to explore from the start?

We think it’s safe to say we now all know social media is largely a failed experiment. It makes our insecurities grow like weeds and makes us feel like we’re not enough.

We are both pretty private people and truly do feel like Instagram and the like are cigarettes for our soul. But we are addicted, and the way society works right now, as musicians, we do need it—and we have to look at the monster we created.

“Phony” is a part of that monster. A series of shortcomings and a dark take on the massive focus on self-narrative and hyper-individualism. The irony of sharing yourself on a platform that was supposed to connect us all, but makes us drift further and further apart.

The production feels deliberately restless, shifting between acoustic and electronic textures. How do you approach the balance between keeping things intimate and pushing into more hyperpop or cinematic territories?

It fits the theme of “Phony” perfectly in that the song itself feels like it’s shapeshifting multiple times over, just like we shapeshift and lose ourselves when impostor syndrome hits.

But also, honestly, we can’t help ourselves. We love these cinematic universes where a baroque guitar part can be succeeded by a thundering arpeggiated bass.

It moves us, and hopefully it’ll move other people too.

You’ve been a significant part of the Copenhagen music scene for years. Does the city still influence your sound in the same way, or has your relationship with the environment changed after taking a break?

There’s a lot of seriously good music coming out of Copenhagen right now—the whole CPH+ thing, Mayhem, Escho, etc.—with alternative, inventive, weird stuff being put out.

But at the moment, we’ve been away for too long to feel part of a specific scene.

The city itself is very inspiring, though, but probably not the way you’d think. It’s the mundanity of the repeated patterns, the friends and family, the doldrums of a rainy day. It’s an incredible place to call home.

With “Phony” marking your return, does this signal a larger collection of music on the horizon, or is this more of a standalone moment for the two of you?

It signals not just a larger collection of music, but a massive collection.

We’ve been writing so much over the past couple of years that we have enough for a couple of records already. It feels great to release the first one now, and that is firmly just the beginning.