Premiere: Volunteer Department – “Robert Downey Jr.”

Today, Nashville indie label Cold Lunch Recordings officially introduce the newest signee to their roster, Volunteer Department, with the premiere of the new single “Robert Downey, Jr.”. The single comes from the Nashville-based octet’s upcoming album Three Dreams with Alma, which will be released later this summer, and it follows the April release of a well-received split single with fellow Indiana native and Cold Lunch artist Heaven Honey.

“Robert Downey, Jr.” is a delicate, building track that depicts a scenario between two lovers who have found themselves separated because of one partner’s inability or unwillingness to recognize the bond that exists between them. The song is constructed with sounds that one might hear during a private late-night confrontation between these two lovers, with slamming kitchen drawers and receding footsteps accompanying the instrumental arrangement. The track was co-produced by Hopkins in collaboration with Thad Kopec (Liza Anne, Bantug, Josh Gilligan), and together the pair have carefully crafted a scene that conjures the feelings of longing and heartache that comes with such a situation.

“RDJr was written from the point of view of a woman who knows that her partner and herself are in love, totally, with one another, however her partner doesn’t know this, or at least they deny themself the knowledge. And that’s devastating, to me,” Hopkins explains. “I always thought it was a fairly fictional tale until about a year after writing it when I realized that I’m actually the woman in the song and that what seemed like a distant observation of something unknown to me was perhaps the careful, albeit subconscious, analysis of something right in front of my face.”

Listen to “Robert Downey, Jr.” by Volunteer Department below.