In ‘Woman Is a Tree’, care and damage coexist. The song presents a figure that is rooted and exposed at once, shaped by relations of dependence and support.
The Last Dinner Party are a London based band formed by Abigail Morris, Emily Roberts, Aurora Nishevci, Georgia Davies and Lizzie Mayland. After the release of their debut album ‘Prelude to Ecstasy’, they began performing ‘Woman Is a Tree’, an unreleased song whose meaning rests almost entirely on its lyrics.
When the song moves forward, it does so through images rather than narrative. Wind and falling birds introduce violence and endurance, holding care and damage together from the outset, as “Blow, winds, crack your cheeks” meets “falling birds” crushed against the pavement.
The line “Woman is a tree” fixes the central metaphor. The tree functions as shelter and structure, rooted and exposed at once. In the closing verse, “Woman is the tree / Man a clinging vine on the branch” defines a relation of dependence and support without softening it. The song ends in stillness, without resolution.
These images resonate with the world outlined in the band’s latest album, ‘From The Pyre’. Conceived as a cycle of ten stories forged from lived experience, the record develops a shared mythology shaped by anger, laughter and elemental landscapes. Forests, hillsides and cliff faces extend the symbolic terrain already present in ‘Woman Is a Tree’.
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