The Wolf Alice song written about Edie Sedgwick
Edie Sedgwick was an archetypal socialite born into privilege, but it wasn’t the shortcut to happiness. Sedgwick’s heartbreaking story has been a source of inspiration to everyone from Bob Dylan to Wolf Alice, who wrote ‘Silk’ about Sedgwick as part of their debut album, My Love Is Cool.
Although she grew up in an extremely wealthy family, money didn’t save Sedgwick from hardship. Mental health struggles were common throughout her household, but the discourse around the topics was a million miles behind today. Therefore, like everybody else in the post-World War II landscape, the issue was ignored.
Her father was a controlling figure who ensured his children were home-schooled for the early years of their lives. When Sedgwick was finally enrolled into boarding school aged 13, she was soon taken out of education because she’d developed bulimia and returned home.
In 1963, things started to take an upward turn when she moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts, and began to study sculpture. It was here that Sedgwick got a taste for the counterculture life and started experiencing what it was like outside her abusive bubble.
Soon later, on her 21st birthday in 1964, Sedgwick received an $80,000 trust fund from her grandmother enabled her to move to New York City. After starting to associate herself with the in-crowd, a chance meeting with Andy Warhol at a party at Lester Persky’s apartment would change her trajectory.
This meeting with Warhol led Sedgwick to become the face of The Factory, starring in various films. She reportedly enjoyed a romance with Bob Dylan, which inspired him to write ‘Like A Rolling Stone’, ‘Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat’ and ‘Just Like a Woman’.
In the following years, Sedgwick developed a barbiturate addiction, which prevented her career from truly taking off. She left the scene behind to return to the family ranch. Despite various relapses and drug-related arrests, she found the courage to complete the autobiographical, Ciao! Manhattan, which was released posthumously in 1972. Sedgwick tragically died aged 28 in 1971 from a fatal cocktail of prescription pills and alcohol. It happened only months after she married Michael Post.
When Ellie Rowsell, the lead singer of Wolf Alice, stumbled upon a book about Sedgwick, she was inspired to write ‘Silk’. Roswell once recalled to 7 Digital: “I had recently read an autobiography of Edie Sedgwick, which spanned from her ancestors to after her death, and that really inspired the track ‘Silk’. She was such a theatrical, special character, so it was fun to imagine what it was like to be her. Her life was so poetic already – and such a tragedy – it was quite easy to put that to music and poetry”.
Although the track doesn’t mention Sedgwick by name, it adds another layer to the song once you know the context behind ‘Silk’. Rowsell sings: “Just looking for a protector, God never reached out in time, There’s love that is a saviour, But that ain’t no love of mine, My love it kills me slowly, Slowly I could die, And when she sleeps she hears the blues, And sees shades of black and white.”
Listen to ‘Silk’ below.
