Holding On and Letting Go: Mourning Doves by Sleep Habits

Sidney Parish

Life moves, seasons change, and some songs stay tucked away until the right moment. There is a quiet beauty in holding onto them long enough for them to find their rightful place in the world. New Orleans-based indie-folk artist Sleep Habits embraces this patience on Mourning Doves, a reflective EP built from older tracks that have grown alongside him. It’s a collection of soft, introspective songs about carrying old feelings, releasing them, and finding comfort somewhere in between.

This 5-track EP opens with “Hold Your Name,” a contemplative song that seems to touch on the idea of clinging onto a memory. Sleep Habits pairs tender, physical closeness with emotional distance, capturing the pang of trying to hold onto words and moments before they disappear. Soft and breathy, his vocals feel like a voice carried by the wind, with a hushed ache treading through every word. We then move into the second song, “Antique Mall.” It oozes with warmth and nostalgia, the kind of bittersweet comfort that nestles gently in the back of your mind. Sleep Habits describes the song, noting:

“At the time I wrote this song, I was coming to terms with the fact that you can’t carry everything with you throughout your life. The physical space of the antique mall symbolizes that feeling. With that symbol as its base, the song explores allowing yourself to hold onto the reverence of memory and acknowledge how it has shaped you, while letting go of the idealistic sense of the ‘good ol’ days’”

Sleep Habits navigates this intricate emotion with remarkable grace. His songwriting and production lay the groundwork, further enriched by an accompanying music video that leans into the song’s wistful nostalgia.

We then move into the third track of the EP, “Helen’s House.” A pensive instrumental track, it’s anchored by a mellow, steady percussion beneath an acoustic foundation, while light piano flourishes weave through the spaces in between. Placed in the middle of the EP, it offers a pause to reflect. After diving into such deep and complex emotions, Sleep Habits seems to urge his listeners to take a moment to not just reflect, but to truly internalize and confront these deeply human emotions. Moving to my personal favorite from the EP, “Space Between” captures a moment of solitary observation. The imagery in this song is bountiful, my favorite verse detailing,

“Street lights launch

Blisters through the fog

Watch them bleed

Brings you to your knees

A silent reprieve”

The song in its entirety feels like a metaphor for the distance between people, moments, and emotions. It’s a quiet yet powerful exploration of isolation and the silent yearning to bridge that gap. “Space Between” does a phenomenal job at evoking both the calm and the discomfort that comes with searching for meaning or connection. Finally, we reach the EP’s namesake, “Mourning Doves.” It’s the emotional catharsis to the project both sonically and lyrically. The aching and yearning is ever present. Sleep Habits’s singing follows the rhythm that the instrumentation sets up in each verse, building up to the powerful crash of emotions in the chorus. It perfectly captures the dissonance between cherished memories and a present that feels hollow by comparison, longing for the effortless joy and trust of youth.

Overall, Mourning Doves offers a tender, unfiltered look at memories, longing, and the lingering emotions we choose to either carry or leave behind as life goes on. Each track gently unpacks the weight of nostalgia and what to do with it, while also addressing the pain of growing older, weaving together moments of reflection and release. Subtle, heartfelt, and deeply human, it leaves you not with answers, but a reassuring sense that these feelings are shared, and it is okay to sit with them for a while.