Lydia Cole

It's been a long while
Lovely way to spend a day
Music still makes sense

(A haiku)

"Follow the navy hobbit, she has the seeeeeds!"

What you can't see here are the 20 other pigeons in hot pursuit. Best morning routine I ever stumbled into.

I'm finding it hard to put things into words at the moment so I'm not posting a lot. But I have been really enjoying my music work and am looking forward to saying something about that. Thanks for still being here! 🎶✨

I met Deva Mahal on Instagram in 2024. She was in my DMs and helping boost what I was sharing in an effort to make our industry safer from predators. She then asked me to add my voice to the backing vocals on her new song Someone's Daughter. It is a powerful song straight from the soul, tackling heartbreaking content with grace, Deva's voice and lyrics captivating. As well as that, her act of inclusion helped mend a little piece of my heart that year.

Someone's Daughter has just been released along with her brand new EP, I hope you take a listen!

Thank you, Deva, and congratulations ✨

Someone's Daughter Provided to YouTube by The Orchard EnterprisesSomeone's Daughter · Deva MahalFUTURE CLASSIC VOL ll: FUTURE℗ 2026 Deva MahalReleased on: 2026-03-27Producer: D...

Every phase is so damn short

Every

Phase

Every career

Every norm 

Every love

Every form

We don't have to use AI just because it's there.

As a creative person working with others on a project, I'm not using AI to do anything that another human could do. I work with incredible people who have spent decades developing their skills and artistic intuition. They enjoy the process of creating, just like I do, and we all work hard to earn a living from it. If I replaced my collaborators with AI, I would lose so much: the philosophical chats, the laughs, the mutual trust, shared stories and wisdom, considering a different perspective, the frustration, the challenge, the breakthroughs. The humanity. The meaning.

📸

Back in February I stopped using Meta and said I was done. That was a call I made out of exasperation triggered by whatever the latest awful Zuckerberg s**t was at the time, which landed on top of, you know: deep stress about politics locally and abroad, belated disappointment in CRS' silence, feeling helpless about genocide, and just the usual burnout recovery (6 years now). I think what I needed was a break. I'm sure you know the feeling.

And I totally know it's a privilege to be able to disconnect from all the horrors. But my sanity is, and has always been, hard won, so I gotta do what I gotta do.

In another draft of this post, this is where I start over-explaining myself, which is a habit I'm trying to (gently and kindly) unwind a little bit. Instead I'm just gonna say: for better and worse, Instagram is where I connect best with many people I really value. So I'm here to stay connected, despite it being a very imperfect platform in a burning world of irresponsible billionaires.

Here are a few photos from my 38th birthday this week. Best birthday so far! We took a quick trip to my Mum's hometown of Te Aroha, also spending a little time in Paeroa and Karangahake Gorge. Te Aroha is where my great-grandpa Hugh King settled after moving here as a young man from Strabane (Northern Ireland) with just his brother. His wife Floriada (née Rasmussen) was born here to Danish and Czech parents who had moved here as children with their families. Cute story: Floriada's twin sister married Hugh's brother. And yes, I have spent the last 6 months building my family tree in an obsessed frenzy, thank you very much 💓

🚨 SOCIAL MEDIA UPDATE 🚨

I'm done with Meta (Instagram, Facebook).
Morally, emotionally, mentally, I'm done.

So I've set up a Substack where I will post updates on my music. This will seamlessly absorb what was my mailing list (if you're subscribed to that, you'll simply keep receiving those emails!) and over at Substack everything I write will appear like a blog where you'll also be able to leave comments 💌

I've also set up a page at Bluesky, which I'll feel out over time. If there is an app/community you discover where people share good stuff, I would love to hear about it.

Here and on Instagram I've learned a lot that has helped me. I realised I was burned out because of an article someone shared. I've connected with many good souls, especially around , mental health and recovery from religion.

And having been chronically unwell, 95% of my socialising and connection has taken place here. But while it's time for me personally to start getting more social in the real world (phew), I do want to stay connected online, on some form of social media. This just ain't it.

I'm still processing this and I don't know what things will look like in two weeks, or a year. Maybe I'll regret this, I don't know. I'm just trying to follow my values and feed the world I want to see, rather than give up and just let the beast eat me alive.

So if you want to stay connected, please sign up to my Substack! ❤️ From there I'll keep up the music news, and when anything changes I'll let you know.

You can subscribe to my Substack here: https://open.substack.com/pub/lydiacole

Thanks so very much for having been here with me 🐞

PS: I think because of the content here, this post will not reach very far within the Meta algorithm so feel free to tell your friends who might like to know!

My 2024 can't be captioned; we would be here forever and honestly, we all have better things to do. But a simple highlight you might enjoy is that after spending more than half the year working on a huge application for funding to record new music, I was successful. It's such great news not only for the new music, but personally, the application process required me to persist even when my post-burnout brain thought I couldn't. A valuable reminder what I'm made of.

Massive thanks to
Thanks also to and for the Mentorship Programme

Wishing all of you peace and hope out there 🐞

It doesn't work for my brain to share this part of the process in any detail BUT we had a very good day recently ✨

Thanks to NZ On Air Music

It's now been five long years since I played and sang in front of people. This thing I started doing aged fifteen and then did as much as possible ever since, I had to stop when I eventually burned out at 32. This thing that took this introvert around the world and had me talking to strangers. This thing that got me out of bed and out of myself.

It was an obvious thing to do and I enjoyed it. But from this distance I don't honestly know how I ever did it, it just seems so bold to me now. And I don't know if my symptoms will allow me to ever do it again, this thing that is now one of the only ways an artist can make any kind of living.

I don't know much. But today I'm just paying my respect to this dormant part of me that somehow existed.

Photo by Naomi Haussmann 2019