Chill AF to the utmost degree. Velvet sound design and expressive vocal delivery in an impressive debut. Remember her. We are really looking forward to what comes next.
Read our interview with the artist below!
Describe your sound in 3 words
Bendy, soulful, reflective.
Tell us a few things about your new work “Remember Less”. What is the main idea behind it? And how your collaboration with Jakob Leventhal has begun?
“Remember Less” is the first song off my upcoming, debut EP called “How You Feel.” I wrote all 5 songs in January-March of this year, when I had just left my home in New York to go back to rural Minnesota for my last few months of college. I was leaving a relationship then, and spending a lot of time thinking about the boy I was leaving behind, wondering if he was thinking about me too. So the song’s about that in-between space where you’re not in touch with someone but you’re thinking about them and about your own decisions. Definitely a product of the Covid-isolation-stuck-in-your-thoughts mentality. When Jakob and I started arranging and tracking it, this song that had begun as a simple acoustic guitar and voice tune just burst out into a much more full sound: something that I think the vastness of those feelings demanded. And it has some real grit to it, which I love.
Jakob and I were good friends from high school, and we played some music together at our lowkey high school shows. His house was always my favorite place to go with our friends, because our nights would end down in his family’s recording studio with us just jamming on random instruments. But we didn’t really dig into our collaboration until we were both in different states for college, and started to pass some song ideas back and forth to one another. When we’d come home for a little while, we’d play together, and those songs we’d started turned into a full-fledged album, our 2020 indie-folk record under our duo name Garden Party. This EP was different for us: Jakob was producing instead of co-writing, and I had written all the songs. It’s so fun to work together in any capacity, though, because we just joke around all the time and push each other.
Which is your most personal and honest lyric?
The chorus repeats this question, “Am I gone from your mind like you are mine,” which is wondering if this other person is thinking about me, or if they’ve moved on in the way that I’m saying that I have. But then the bridge comes in with the real insight, saying “you were never mine.” I think that line hits me every time, and it just felt right when I got it down in the lyrics the first time, because this whole song I’m saying that I’ve lost something I once had, but the bridge is the slap in the face that maybe I never had it in the first place. So then, why am I thinking about it so much, you know? Again it’s that in-between.
Artists and people who have influenced and inspired you?
Lianne la Havas, Ella Fitzgerald, Norah Jones, Chet Baker.
Tell us something you love/hate about New York
I love how many languages you can hear people speaking on a single block. I hate subway delays.
What is the biggest challenge you have faced as an artist so far?
Not being able to play music with my band or for an audience during quarantine was heartbreaking. I was working in a studio by myself for a lot of this past year, and there were some moments where I felt really at ease and like I was in my element, but most of the time I was really struggling with finding my love for music when it didn’t involve working with other people. It was really lonely, and the music wasn’t that great.
What was the best film you have watched during the quarantine?
I remember watching Portrait of a Lady on Fire one night by myself in early quarantine (last April or so) and feeling so shocked that I got to watch something that good just by stumbling across it. It’s so good.
One last thing we should know about you?
I’m just getting started.
Thank you!
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