FFO: The Mist Calls – Words Are For Later

The Mist Calls are Millie and Joe, a duo from the North-East coast whose sound folds folk and jazz into poetic, slow‑burn storytelling, all woven through intricate guitar lines and rich, close‑knit harmonies.

The duo release their latest single Words Are For Later, carrying a charming analogue warmth through its production, with bright, intricate guitar lines, spritely woodwind curling around the mix, and gentle percussion and strings adding extra texture, all lifting the melodious vocals that bloom even more beautifully when the harmonies kick in.

Here, the duo summarise the sounds of the Words Are For Later, using three other songs…

Besame Mucho – João Gilberto 

Over time, we’ve found our love of bossa nova has grown and grown. ‘Besame Mucho’ is one of our favourites, because of the beautiful intricacies of the voice, the subtle hypnotic rhythm, and the layering of a variety of instruments. These particular elements of the song provided great inspiration for our own song – with Millie playing violin and Joe playing flute, we definitely wanted to include an orchestral jazz element through sweeping violin and delicate, floating flute melodies in ‘Words Are For Later’.

How Insensitive (Insensatez) – the Antônio Carlos Jobim & Frank Sinatra version 

This is another song which we hope you can hear elements of in our music – we loved the rising build of instruments with the twinkling splashes of flute and violin scattered throughout, and the uplifting and relaxing mood all of this creates. We love how cinematic this piece feels – we’re really fascinated with this style of music, where the instruments as well as the words tell a story. This is one of our hopes too, when creating music – we want to leave space for our instruments to sing. In ‘Words Are For Later’ we leaned into creating a cinematic ambience, similar to ‘How Insensitive (Insensatez)’. We also want to leave a lasting feeling or mood with listeners and we hope our song leaves people feeling uplifted and peaceful.

Still Beating – Mac DeMarco

We love experimenting with our two guitars together and seeing where it takes us. Listening to the smooth and precise playing of Mac DeMarco’s guitar in this song, hugely inspired us to shine the spotlight on guitar instrumentals in ‘Words Are For Later’. We also love the vocal style in ‘Still Beating’, where it feels very authentic. We love to create a clean and natural sound with our own music, so this song really resonated with us when we heard it for the first time. We hope that because of our clear vocals, listeners become curious and reflective about our storytelling and poetic lyrics.