Running into an ex is awkward enough without having to pretend the two of you are practically strangers, and Canadian singer-songwriter Cassie Dasilva knows that feeling all too well, as she turns one particularly uncomfortable hometown moment into her new single.
The hook-driven pop track explores the strange experience of making polite small talk with somebody who once knew you intimately, and it is funny, uncomfortable and surprisingly vulnerable, capturing that moment when someone from your past unexpectedly reappears and reminds you of feelings you thought you’d left behind.
The inspiration came after Cassie bumped into someone she’d had an intense, on-and-off relationship with during high school. While he seemed perfectly comfortable chatting about life as though they were old friends, she found herself overwhelmed by memories of their relationship. “It’s crazy that you’re just casually catching up with me like we’re old pals when you’ve literally seen me unclothed,” she recalls thinking.
“This song highlights one of the horrors of living back in your hometown: running into someone you used to date and having to make casual small talk with them like nothing ever happened,” Cassie days. “I wrote it immediately after bumping into somebody I’d had an intense, on-and-off thing with back in high school. He started making small talk with me and all of these feelings came flooding back, and I was like… wait, no, it’s crazy that you’re just casually catching up with me like we’re old pals when you’ve literally seen me unclothed. It just really messed with my head, and I couldn’t understand how he could be so nonchalant about it all. Evidently, I don’t pretend well, and so I wrote a whole song about it.”
That contrast between outward politeness and internal panic gives her new song its charm, as it is also familiar territory for an artist who’s spent years examining the complicated, occasionally ridiculous nature of relationships. When I first spoke with Cassie back in 2021 about her debut EP, she explained how heartbreak, unanswered questions and finding new love could all exist simultaneously. By 2024, she was exploring her scepticism towards traditional relationships on “part of the club,” a love song that challenged her own cynical outlook. Her latest single feels like another chapter in that ongoing conversation, only this time she’s confronting the uncomfortable reality that some relationships never entirely disappear from memory.
The accompanying music video takes that nostalgia even further, with Dasilva wandering through the fairgrounds of the same park in Orillia, Ontario, where the real-life encounter happened. Filmed on a lo-fi handycam, the visuals resemble an old home movie, capturing the bittersweet atmosphere of a small-town Canadian summer while allowing familiar surroundings to bring old memories rushing back.
The release also signals a return to the singer-songwriter influences that first inspired Cassie, particularly the emotionally honest storytelling of female artists from the late ’90s and early 2000s. There’s something fitting about that creative direction, especially considering she’s now finding inspiration in the hometown she once wanted to escape.
