SOURCE: People Magazine By Kimberlee Speakman
Alicia Witt is showing off her “Clever Mind.”
The actress, pianist and singer gave some new details on what inspired her new single, which is set to be released Friday from her upcoming EP Witness.
“Clever Mind” is a special one for Witt, as it was the only song on her new EP that she had written years ago alongside “I Hope You Dance” songwriter Tia Sillers and her late husband Mark Selby.
Describing the song as an “attempt to find forgiveness and understanding” for the other woman in a relationship she once had, Witt said she wanted to illustrate all the emotions that a woman in that situation may have felt.
“[The song] is about the pain of falling in love with someone who isn’t available — tumbling down a rabbit hole of desperation to believe they’re going to leave their relationship for you; and knowing you have only yourself to blame,” Witt, 47, explained.
“I wrote this song from the imagined perspective of the ‘other woman’ in a relationship I’d been in. Imagining how lonely it must have been for her — knowing that as painful as it had been for me, learning my partner had been unfaithful, it must have been even more painful for her. This song helped me to find forgiveness and even empathy for her,” she said.
Many of the lyrics echo these sentiments as she sings over a piano and guitar tune. The song is the second song from her latest EP after the title track “Witness” released in April.
Witt previously found success with her single “Chasing Shadows” from her album The Conduit which spent more than a month on Billboard’s AC chart in 2021.
Speaking to PEOPLE about what the single’s success meant to her in 2021, Witt said she had “no words” for the accomplishment.
“To have been in the top 30 for five weeks, to know that this song I made up is being heard on the radio to that extent, it’s a deep, deep glow,” she told PEOPLE.
“It’s just something I will forever be so proud of. I’ll always be so glad that The Conduit was the album that first got a song on the charts…” she added.
Witt was recently featured as a contestant on Fox’s The Masked Singer where she won her first episode by singing a rendition of “Over the Rainbow.” She will also be featured in the film Longlegs opposite Nicolas Cage in 2024.