Looking for your new favorite song? Look no further, as Sarah Hartstein, known professionally as Sarah Michelle Lee, will be releasing a brand new single later this spring, “Kissing You.”
“It’s just supposed to be a simple, cutesy pop song,” Lee said. “[It] captures the fleeting moment of a one-night stand, or when you first meet someone and you just kind of lose yourself in the feeling. And then you’re like, oh wait I don’t even know this person and they don’t know me, but that’s fine.”
Lee has another song in her discography, “Superstar,” released March 1 of this year. “Kissing You” will be her second record in one year.
“A lot of little snippets of lyrics will come to me when I’m in the shower or something,” Lee said. “The lyrics ‘You don’t know me, you just like kissing me, but I like kissing you too / I know you have your reasons why you’re leaving, but I don’t want to hear them right now,’ came to me, and I just formed the song around that.”
Alongside the song, a music video for “Kissing You” is in the works, Lee’s first solo music video. The music video, filmed by Lee’s brother and Brooklyn-based videographer Sydney Tate, is set to be released the same day. Lee’s inspiration behind the music video draws from familiar songwriters in the industry, such as Phoebe Bridgers, but also from her own sense of joy.
“I wanted it to be really silly ,because the song is silly and it’s kind of just for fun,” said Lee. “This song is [about] putting your heart out there, so I got this literal giant heart costume online.”
Behind-the-scenes-looks at the video show Lee going around Washington Square Park in New York City in an oversized red heart costume, eating ice cream and dancing with the city streets in the background.
“[My brother] was able to shoot it from the roof, so I’m twirling around in the street in the costume,” Lee said. “It’s super silly and out there.”
Both the song and music video are set to be released on May 31. You can pre-save the track on Spotify, Apple Music and Tidal, as well as subscribing to notifications from Lee.
Besides her solo work, Lee is the lead singer for the band monarch., a Hudson Valley originate band that is currently based in Brooklyn. Previously covered by The Oracle, monarch. was formed in 2021 and is composed of Lee, her brother Jesse Hartstein, Nick Pappalardo, Alex Alfaro and Darius Beckford.
Before the release of “Kissing You,” you can check out Sarah and Monarch at the Newburgh Brewing Company on May 11, which will be the band’s first performance back in the Hudson Valley after a two-year absence.