Ghostly Kisses / Richie Quake

Ghostly Kisses is the dreamy pop music of singer-songwriter Margaux Sauvé. The name Ghostly Kisses was inspired by William Faulkner’s poem “Une ballade des dames perdues,” and seemed like the perfect reflection of Sauvé’s ethereal voice.

With Heaven, Wait, her mesmeric debut album ready for release, her songwriting has developed to the point that—for the first time—she feels like she is part of the conversation. Able to view herself with an external eye, the album reflects transitions and rebirth. Sauvé is still talking about difficult situations, but with the ability to cast someone else in the lead role, giving the music a deeply personal, yet starkly universal appeal—one which she feels has come from “a more mature, adult way of looking at it.”

Heaven, Wait was recorded largely at home with her partner (in music and in life), Louis-Étienne Santais. Working separately in the same house, they would bounce ideas between rooms before coming together to rehearse the songs. Once they had the songs in place and were happy with them, they worked on the files in real time with producers Tim Bran and Thomas Bartlett.

Together, they have created an album that nods to her contemporaries like Billie Eilish and Aurora, blending pop songs in sophisticated production; but Ghostly Kisses looks back further, to Royksopp’s “Running to the Sea” and to the indie pop band London Grammar. (Sauvé first learned to sing by trying to imitate Hannah Reid—a gateway to discovering her own way of singing.)

A sensitive socialite raised in Brooklyn, Richie Quake sounds like he creates in those moments of clarity, as your inebriation peaks and the sun rises. With a cinematic, retro-indie sound and crooning vocals, Quake weaves periodic spaces between jointed musicality and pure instrumentation, crafting an element of softness and fresh air. Acting as the main writer, producer, and instrumentalist on all his music, Richie designs his own world of sensitivity and raw emotion.