Indie-folk singer-songwriter Alice Dudley’s 2021 single Hunker Down has been picked up by BBC Introducing.

Alice explained she wrote the song in 2017 but it wasn’t officially released until 2021.

She sent it off to BBC Introducing, along with a couple of other singles, late last year. Its aim is to support unsigned, undiscovered and under-the-radar musicians.

‘Of all the songs I’ve written, Hunker Down is probably the one that I’m the most proud of, so finding out that it had been played on BBC Introducing in Cumbria was such a lovely moment,’ Alice said.

Alice explained: ‘I wanted it to feel like a soundtrack to a cold winter’s day – think sitting by the fire with a big mug of hot chocolate, watching a storm raging outside from your comfy chair,’ she said.

‘It’s a love song, but to me it captures that feeling of being utterly content, safe and sound from the world outside.’

She said the song came together when she worked on it with Gyp Buggane at Ballagrove Studio: ‘The harmonies and the super delicate instrumentation really added something, but there was definitely still a missing element that we couldn’t figure out.

‘I was still at university at the time, and I remember playing it to my housemates in the kitchen on a gorgeous summer’s day.

‘The door was wide open and we realised that there was a blackbird in our garden singing along – it was such a special moment and it just completed the song perfectly.’

She spent an afternoon recording the blackbird’s song before sending it to Gyp to fit into the final track.

Alice, from Douglas, first picked up a guitar when she was five and after a love-hate relationship with guitar lessons, started gigging when she was 12.

‘I started writing my own music a few years later, though a lot of those early songs have definitely been left behind!’

She described her music as ‘rose-tinted and bittersweet’, adding: ‘The signature blend of romantic optimism and sadness that every 20-something year old possesses.

She said the airtime had given her a boost, saying: ‘It’s definitely given me a sense of momentum moving forwards.

‘I’ve recently moved back to Falmouth, which was where I went to university and also where I wrote the majority of the songs I’ve released so far.

‘It’s always felt like such an exciting place to be and has definitely inspired my creativity in a way that no other place has before.

‘Right now I’m writing some new stuff, looking for other musicians to work with and trying to branch out into bigger gigs.’