Not only is the song, Lion in the Closet, an ode to Petrie’s battle with depression but the Castlemaine artist will be joined on stage for its launch by the therapist who helped him recover.

Petrie said a series of therapy sessions with Tamra Mercieca played a pivotal role in helping him overcome his demons.

“I’ve known Tamra for a very long time and it was actually only by chance that I found out about the sessions,” he said.

“I hadn’t caught up with Tamra for a long time and I noticed she was speaking in Kyneton at a book shop and I went in to listen to her talk and ended up doing some sessions with her and it really changed my life, so I couldn’t really launch this CD without having her there.”

Along with Ms Mercieca’s help, Petrie said writing the song itself had been a therapeutic process.

“I’ve got a fairly strong emotional attachment to that song, it was a big step putting all of the thoughts and that process into a song,” he said.

“From the moment I wrote it and decided it was finished I was pretty confident that it was the song I really wanted to push.”

Petrie said Lion in the Closet was “very much about light and shade”.

“The song is about my journey in recognising that I had depression and getting treatment for it and eventually moving past that,” he said.

“It’s about recognising the world you’re perceiving is perhaps not the real world and trying to break through that.”

The song has evolved since it was first penned 12 months ago and now prominently features a cello motif courtesy of Skye Myers.

“We did have a violin player playing with us for a period there and he had to leave for other commitments and it took a while to find a replacement and work out a new path,” Petrie said.

“I couldn’t be happier with the end result, I wasn’t going to be happy without it having some sort of strings on it so I wanted to make sure if we’re going to do it we do it right.”

Petrie said an EP or full length album would be in the works following the release of Lion in the Closet and its two B sides.

“Once this is all out in the world we’ll start thinking about the next one, we’ve definitely got enough songs there so that’s something we’re very keen to do,” he said.

Trevor Petrie and The War of Ideas will launch the single Lion in the Closet at Nest in High St, Thornbury on November 28.

An accompanying animated film clip, produced by Bendigo’s Dylan Fowler, will also be screened in full on the night.

Tickets are strictly limited and available from shop.parlourgigs.com/product/trevorpetriesinglelaunch