Teen Idle Premieres Her Impactful Music Video for Incendiary Single “Burning”

If you’re “Burning” for some moving and impassioned power pop, then Teen Idle is bound to satisfy that desire. The music writing project of singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Sara Abdelbarry, she has followed up the single’s release with its accompanying music video today, which perfectly matches the pensive, melancholy sound of the song.

Although it was before her lifetime, there’s something about this song that feels very ’90s when female artists such as Alanis Morrisette, Jewel, Tory Amos, and Fiona Apple were leading a rock revolution. It also matches the emotional heaviness of that music with a song about heartbreak, abuse, and misery.

Explaining to us the context of the song and the music video, Abdelbarry tells us:

“‘Burning’ is mostly about the sting of trying to chase after an unrequited romance, but the music video tackles a very different subject: physical and emotional abuse and the precarious position that often puts women in. The story that fuels the music video isn’t based on my own personal experience, but when the idea was pitched to me, I was amazed how well the trajectory of the song seemed to align with the subject matter and the emotional climax of the story.

“The video is a passion project that I’m grateful for Chamber Six Media to have ideated, created, and filmed thousands of miles away from me in Fargo, North Dakota. I’m hoping the video, which really feels like it doubles as a short film, puts battered women’s voices at the forefront and celebrates female resilience and strength. Supporting this idea, so many women were involved in building the video from the ground up, from the actors, to the locations, to makeup, to the extras, and the song itself.”

At just the age of 24, Abdelbarry has accomplished a lot with Teen Idle since she developed the project in the final year of college in New York City while completing her degree in English Literature. In the summer of 2018, she started to take songwriting more seriously, challenging herself to write a song each day for a week before posting them online. Once she got into a rhythm, it led her to a very productive place in her life where the songs she was writing began to sound much larger and more substantial than in the bedroom she was writing them.

By June 2020, she had released her debut Teen Idle EP Insomniac Dreams, with certain songs finding themselves in regular rotation on radio stations on the Pacific Coast. Abdelbarry looks to a diversity of influences when composing her music. From the guitar-heavy sound of more classic rock female artists to the more distorted sounds of the ’80s and ’90s rock to the musical traditionalism of her heritage, Abdelbarry is a very inspired young woman just scratching the surface of her creative abilities.

Show Dates:

04/28 – Finnegan’s Pub (w/ Sonic Blume and OM-53), Hoboken, NJ
04/29 – Stage Dive (w/ Winkler), Glassboro, NJ
05/20 – The Saint (w/ J Solomon and Loveseat Pete), Asbury Park, NJ

Artwork for the single “Burning” by Teen Idle