Abe Yellen’s “South of Italy”: Where Lost Love Meets the Promise of What’s Next

By Myescha Joell

Abe Yellen’s “South of Italy” is the kind of song that settles into you slowly — a warm, unhurried ache dressed in acoustic guitar, lush strings, and the kind of melody that makes you feel like you’ve heard it before, even when you haven’t. The fourth single off his upcoming debut album, Long Goodbye, the track is cinematic in the truest sense: it doesn’t just tell a story, it places you inside one. And the story it’s telling is about love that’s been lost — and the strange, beautiful hope that comes after.

The song traces back to a solo trip Yellen took to Italy in late 2021. Moving through Florence, Siena, Rome, Capri, and Positano, he found himself drawn to the music of Piero Piccioni — the Italian film composer whose lush 1960s scores blanketed his travels with a particular kind of longing. Melody came first, arriving somewhere between the cobblestones and coastline. The lyrical story didn’t crystallize until he returned stateside.

“When I got back in the studio in Austin, that’s really when I think it finally came together — I was able to tell more of a chronological, left-to-right story,” shared Abe Yellen.

On the production side, the track grew out of a collaborative session with fellow artists Taylor Armstrong and Callan Brown. Armstrong had been working through an acoustic guitar idea — harmonically complete but still searching for a direction — and Yellen heard something in those chords immediately. He took the idea, lived with it for nearly a year, and when he finally returned to shape the vocal melody and arrangement, the song found itself. The final touch came from UK-based award-winning composer, orchestrator, and cellist Matt Hawken, brought in to handle all the string work — and the one who pushed the track into fully cinematic territory.

“Matt Hawken did all the string work on that song. He did a beautiful job — he’s a genius for sure. Some folks have listened and said it’s very cinematic, and I think that’s kudos to his fine work,” enthused Abe Yellen.

As for a visual, Yellen has a clear picture in his head: a Super 8 camera, the Italian countryside, montage footage that lets the landscape do the talking. Nothing is locked yet, but the intention to return to Italy and capture it is real. In the meantime, studio performance footage is being filmed in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in April. Meanwhile, Yellen has his eye on house shows as his preferred live format this year — an intimate setting that fits an album this close to the bone.

“In a dream world, we’d fly out and shoot one there [in Italy]. Seems like anything else would be cutting it short,” added Abe Yellen.

Long Goodbye — the full debut Yellen has spent years quietly building toward — arrives in April, preceded by one final single. “Farfisa” drops March 27th, named after the instrument he wrote it on: a vintage 1960s organ with a dreamy, transportive quality — the same one Sly Stone once played. The album itself was born from the experience of divorce, but Long Goodbye isn’t an angry record. It’s a love letter — honest, lived-in, and shaped by the kind of loss that quietly teaches you something if you let it.

“Music, for me, was always therapy,” explained Abe Yellen.

Born in Petaluma, California, and raised in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, Yellen found his footing on church stages and open mic nights before trading college for the road and joining his older brother’s band Night Beds on tour. He eventually landed in Austin, where he spent years building records for other artists — helping them find their sound while quietly stockpiling his own. His influences run wide: the Beach Boys, Bob Dylan, the Four Tops, Marvin Gaye, Bossa Nova, and Jazz. Genre has always been a complicated question for him — not because he lacks identity, but because he’s after something bigger. He’d rather create the genre than fit into one.

“Wouldn’t it be cool if, in your lifetime, you were responsible for a new genre? Motown was a label that became a genre. Then you have João Gilberto and Antônio Carlos Jobim, who were the grandfathers of Bossa Nova. Maybe I’m trying to find a new one. I just haven’t found it yet,” shared Abe Yellen.

He closed with a T.S. Eliot quote from his famous poem “Ash Wednesday” that felt less like a citation and more like a mission statement: “Because I know that time is time and place is always and only place and what is actual is actual only for one time and only for one place” — and then offered simply: “Hopefully this all comes at the right time. You never know when the right time is, but I’m glad it’s coming out now.”

Before the full record lands, look out for “Farfisa,” the final single from Long Goodbye, dropping March 27th. It’s the last single to be released before the full project arrives. Long Goodbye drops in April. 

“South of Itlay” is now available on all streaming platforms, with promotional support from Starlight PR.

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Written in partnership with Tom White