New Sunday
Founded in 2026, New Sunday blends storytelling, indie folk-rock and personal songwriting. We spoke with Einar Askelsson about creativity, collaboration, recovery, and the project’s evolving sound.
1. New Sunday was founded in January 2026 by songwriter Einar Askelsson, with vocalist Elizabet “Lizzie” and producer Simon joining the project. How did this collaboration come together, and what does each member bring to the New Sunday sound?
I had released a few singles under my name. I got this idea of creating a project with a band label. I thought it would have a better chance to get noticed. Maybe I´m wrong.
When I wanted to release the first song, I looked for a vocalist and a producer and found LIzzie and Simon. So, I hired them. New Sunday is a studio band and maybe in the future I could use another vocalist and a producer. Who knows. The collaboration between me, Lizzie and Simon has been great. That´s why I hired the for the next songs. The reason for that I had the feeling together we would find the sound for New Sunday music.
To answer what each member brings to New Sunday I must tell you about the process of releasing a new song.
All my songs start with the lyrics. I have a bunch of poems I can use and create a story. All my songs are storytelling. I write the lyrics and the music. I usually do it on guitar. I usually create some piece of work that could lead to a song. I keep everything I create. Hookpad Theory is a website I found some years ago. For me with primitive recording equipment was a treasure to me. There you have a template to arrange your songs. You can also write song there and I´ve done that many times. Taken ideas from writing on my guitar and continuing to finish the song. What is great about Hookpad you have access to all instruments you need. They sound pretty good. But this not an AI site. There´s nothing automatic. To be able to use that template you must have at least basic knowledge in music theory. That´s what I´ve learned through the years. On the template you decide the key, the tempo, time signature and then you put in a chord progression for each part of the song. I use often Intro-verse-verse-pre-chorus-Chorus-Bridge-Chorus-Outro. When writing a song on guitar for example you get an idea for the melodies. What you must do so that template will work is put in all the notes in the melodies. Not easy. While doing that I go back and forth in rewriting some stuff and also the lyrics to fit fo the melody. This is a time-consuming work. When I´m done I can export an instrumental audio file fo the songs. That´s what I send to Lizzie to sing over. She has a full artistical freedom to have opinions how to interpret the melody for example. That doesn´t necessarily change the songs. She is a pro and does her best to sing in the mood of the song. When Lizzie is finished, we send all the stuff our magician Simon the producer. He can add instruments if necessary. He does the final arrangement and mixes the song. While he is working, we are in constant communication. Also, with Lizzie. All three of us have an option of what version we should release. That´s it.
2. “Here I Am Meant To Be” is your fourth single, following “Echoes In The Dark” and “The Empty Street.” What was the story or emotion that first inspired this particular song, and what did you want listeners to take away from it?
What inspired this song is the same as the song you mentioned. Since I started the New Sunday project in January 2026, we have already found our sound. When I got sick of CPTSD I was desperate to find anything help me to attack the horrible pain from anxiety and panic attacks and emotional flashback. Meaning feeling the same pain from the trauma from childhood. I wrote a lot and one morning I saw I had written a poem and didn´t remember it. I had never written a poem in my life. So I started to use that format to express emotions in my mind into words.
I want listeners to listen to the story. If so they´ll have a better understanding about the music.
3. Your songwriting process begins with lyrics and stories, often drawn from poems and personal experiences, before the music is built around them. How does starting with the lyrics influence the chords, melodies, and overall atmosphere of a New Sunday song?
That´s a brilliant question. I´ve already told you a little about this in my answer t question one. While learning how to play the guitar and to write songs I used the poems I had written to inspire me. That´s why I have to have the words in front of me to be able to write the music. The lyrics are always a story. Not always straight forward. Often the words have double meaning. From the lyrics and the story, I have to visualize the story. When writing the music, I´m simply building a structure for the lyrics in chords and notes.
Before New Sunday I used many chords in each song. Change the chords for the chorus, the pre chorus or a bridge. That´s not necessarily bad. I took it up from researching, for example, Paul McCartney songwriting. In his best songs he uses a lot of chords and you can hear the melody through the chords. He wrote totally different than John Lennon.
It’s not easy to put a one label on the genre of New Sunday music. Indie Folk-Rock or Pop is maybe the umbrella. In the songs you can hear country, Latin etc.
When writing the songs we have released, I tried to use as few chords as possible. They are all 4-6 chords songs. With my visual “film” from the lyrics in my head the melodies for each part came pretty easily. From verse to pre chorus and chorus you don´t have to use different course you can tweak the melody, the tempo, the instruments and the vocals. This has been a great learning process for me. But If I hadn´t that visual “film” from the lyrics in my head I wouldn´t be able to do it this way.
4. You, Lizzie, and Simon have developed New Sunday remotely without having met in person. How does that unusual creative setup work in practice, and how do you maintain artistic freedom while making decisions together?
Another great question. You see before New Sunday I had hired a few vocalists to sing my songs. I always instructed them how I would like the vocal to sound. With a vocal file and instrumental file I got stuck. I couldn´t let is sound professional. I knew I had to hire a producer (they are not cheap).
I don´t see it unusual setup. The tech today allows you to do this. Yes, being together might be easier to learn about each other but that´s something I can´t afford. With Lizzie and Simon, I was lucky because from the start they understood what I wanted and during these 4-5 songs we have released we now know each other very well. Artistical freedom is no problem. I want to release a song as good as possible. They know music so if they have ideas to make the song better then I welcome it. The three of us are communication throughout the process af creating the song.
5. Your journey into songwriting began during a difficult period in your life, when picking up the guitar became an important part of your recovery and eventually led you toward writing music and poetry. Looking back, how has that journey shaped the songwriter and artist you are today?
Your questions are great because it´s hard to answer them in few words. After battling the CPTSD for 2 years I ended up totally burnt out and was lucky to be alive. I was on the lowest point you get in a life. My nervous system, my defend mechanism were gone. It was like being empty. After deciding to walk the long and difficult road to recovery I started to learn a lot of things about being human. It was like an opportunity to become a new person. That´s when I discovered the artist element in me. That´s how it started. My experience of going through the illness and the recovery has totally shaped me as a songwriter and a musician. But I´m still learning to become a better songwriter so the life I live today is also shaping me. In my daily life I don´t think about my past. I live for the moment. The lyrics in our songs are because I have a lot of material from the past. I probably will start to write about something else.
6. “Here I Am Meant To Be” continues the sound New Sunday has been developing, while you’ve also said that every future song could take a different direction. What can listeners expect from New Sunday next, and what are your longer-term ambitions for the project?
For the next single they can expect a similar sounding song. After that I really want to create new stories. Not necessarily what I experience. I don´t see our sound changes because of it. The songs so far have been in mid to up tempo. I want to release a slower song. I do have some ideas in my catalogue. I really don´t have any future ambitions or I haven´t really thought about it. I hope the 3 of us can work together as long as possible. I have one dream or a goal. It would make me very happy if other musicians would like to record my songs. I look at that as a indicator my songs are good if someone wants to record them. It´s so hard to judge yourself as a songwriter. We can end this by saying I´m just starting. Who know to what It leads me.