LOONY, aka Scarborough, Ontario’s Kira Huszar, today shares her first single of 2023, the characteristically soulful, voluminous, sunny single “Old Friends,” released independently via AWAL and produced by great friends and Grammy nominated collaborators Akeel Henry (Jamine Sullivan, John Legend), Dan Farber (Lizzo) and Aaron Paris (Kanye West, Drake). The mature but playful song reads like a one-sided conversation or voicemail message, leaning into a breezy, classic melody with epic Motown-like harmony stacks. Listen/watch “Old Friends,”  HERE.

“Old Friends” took shape during a spontaneous and intimate jam session in Los Angeles, and sets a traditionally LOONY-esque, soulful backdrop for the summer and accurately encapsulates her timeless writing style and effortless vocals. With inspiration from the likes of Erykah Badu, Sade, Alicia Keys, The Roots, and Etta James, “Old Friends” booms with sun-woozy but dexterous guitar lines, luxurious vocal stacks, and a bright padding of synths to support her gorgeous voice, singing lyrics written without concern for being “cool,” but rather written with the rawest emotion possible.

Of the track, LOONY shares, “Sometimes, when it’s all over, you never talk to that person again. Other times, time passes, and you find yourself absent-mindedly smiling thinking of them or even reaching out to see how life’s treating them. But it’s not like it was before – it’s platonic now. The intimacy from what was once romance remains, it just looks a little different. You’re able to just look at that person for who they are, for you know them quite well, and they know you. You roll your eyes at them just the same but all the hurt is gone. Or most of it, at least. There’s something really sweet and singular to me about those moments, about those relationships. When relationships can often go so ugly, it’s a privilege when it ends to gain an old friend.’

LOONY has already gained fans at FADER, Complex, Line of Best Fit and more for her lush, earnest voice; she’s also been featured on lauded Apple and Spotify curated playlists alike. There’s a method to Kira Huszar’s madness. From the outset of her 2018 debut EP, PART 1, through the 25 million+ streamed JOYRiDE and most recent, soft thing, LOONY has been offering listeners revelatory, neo-soul-inflected pieces of her reality.

LOONY has come a long way from skipping musical theater classes in high school to make mixtapes in her basement: Working with Adam Pondang and Noah ‘40’ Shebib protege Akeel Henry (Ty Dolla $ign, Jeremih, Jazmine Sullivan) on soft thing, LOONY summons musical shades of gospel, jazz, hip hop, and R&B, as on “faceless” and “raw,” which recall early Erykah Badu, The Roots and peak-era D’Angelo in both their enigmatic funkiness and Huszar’s poignant mastery of vocal inflection. At its core, the quarantine-made EP was a diligent exploration of love in many forms, from the euphoric expectation of flirtation to the inextricable hope for a grandparent to stay safe in the midst of a global pandemic. With the release of “Old Friends” we enter into a new chapter of her inextinguishable spirit and verve for finding the beauty in being vulnerable. There’s much more on the horizon for LOONY this year.