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Holly Long
98 Plays1 year ago
Holly Long is an actor turned singer songwriter from Los Angeles, CA by way of Evanston, IL who has released four albums since the early 2000s as a solo artist and three with her band “Bullyheart”. Her most recent release, 2023’s Land of the Living is a concept album filled with character studies around murder. Victims, detectives, mediums. That record came with a companion limited-series podcast of the same name and in this world of so many true crime podcasts I can’t believe it wasn’t huge.
She writes and records cinematic, moody pop and rock music that would be at home on the radio in any number of recent decades….and in fact has found its way into the soundtracks of a handful of television shows.
We have a far-reaching chat and end up talking more about creative process and just generally the path of developing oneself as an artist than we do about the specifics of her songs.
I fully enjoyed this conversation and if you like getting in the weeds of creative process, theatre, Shakespeare, chasing cool (or not) the weird videos we end up thumbing through on TikTok and Instagram and why it compels us to still take the Sunday paper; you’ll likely enjoy it too.
You can find Holly and Bullyheart at www.bullyheart.com and all her music and her limited series Podcast Land of the Living everywhere you stream.
Annika Bennett "Universe"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLLNS7ZcRGk
To support my work on this podcast and my musical journey, come join me on Patreon (there’s a free option if your’e cheap or broke): http://www.patreon.com/wilsbach
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to SongPod and Holly Long
00:00:01
Speaker
Welcome to Willsbach's SongPod, a show where we dig deep into the songs and artists that move us and how we're moved to craft the songs we write. I'm Tim Willsbach, and I write, release, and perform music as Willsbach, and you can find me anywhere you stream music. Let's dig in.
00:00:17
Speaker
Today's guest is a singer-songwriter from Los Angeles, California, who releases music with her band Bully Heart, 2014's Anti-Gravity, 2018's Queen Mab, and her most recent release, Land of the Living, released in 2023, which is a concept album filled with character studies around murder. Victims, detectives, mediums.
00:00:38
Speaker
That record came with a companion limited series podcast of the same name, and in this world of so many true crime podcasts, I can't believe it wasn't huge. Seriously, check it out. It's so much fun.
Holly Long's Musical Journey
00:00:48
Speaker
ah She writes and records cinematic, moody pop and rock music that would be at home on the radio in any number of recent decades. And in fact, her music has found its way into the soundtracks of a handful of television shows.
00:01:01
Speaker
We had a great chat on the phone last week getting ready for our real conversation today. We talked about Naked Eyes covering Burt Bacharach, how we both start out as actors, or wannabe actors in my case. And I'm very excited to continue and dig deeper into the details with this super creative human being. Please welcome to Willsbox Songpod, Holly Long. Holly, how are you? That's amazing. I'm i'm wondering if maybe if you if I can hire you to write all my publicity.
00:01:26
Speaker
I mean, they do say that you should have someone else write your bio, which I'm not not sure I've ever put into practice. But here yeah, it turns out I'm in. i I love it. Thank you. That was awesome. You write and release music and as as bully heart. Yeah. Tell me about how that got started.
00:01:42
Speaker
Well, I used to release music um under my own name, under Holly Long, for the first decade of releasing music, which was 2000 through about 2010. The first four albums that I have, I put out under my own name because I was a singer-songwriter. And I consider myself a singer-songwriter. And I put out, each album sort of has a little bit of a different vibe to it. um The first one is like late 90s sort of,
00:02:10
Speaker
Lilith Fair inspired like Sarah McLaughlin and Paula Cole and all that and the Americana album and then the fourth one under my name was like a um like a 70s studio album like soul funk pop rock kind of thing and I had this fabulous like decade-long arc of a singer-songwriter career.
00:02:56
Speaker
And then something happened in 2010 where I was like, I think I'm done. Not making music, but I'm like, there's like a chapter is over, you know, and you can sort of organically feel that. I think I was just tired of feeling um so uncool. ah ah Yeah, right. yeah In a certain way, you know, I was like, yeah.
00:03:21
Speaker
ah I was like, wouldn't it be so much cooler? I feel like I would get so much more props or something. I'd get so much more visibility. I'd have so much more opportunity to connect connecting with audience.
00:03:32
Speaker
if I was in a band or I joined a band or I formed a band. So um since no one was asking me to be in their band, I just continued to write songs. And then I i sort of hired wholly different crews to produce an engineer and um play with me such that my music started to sound and feel much more like a new wave indie rock band. And so then I decided I'd go by a band name. And so now Bully Heart is my band name.
00:03:59
Speaker
Gotcha. You know, the teenage desire to be cooler. Yes, right. which like That never leaves. Yeah, no, it never does. That's I mean, still what drives me to this day. And i I probably have a handful of songs in in me that I haven't gotten out yet about that very particular thing, like constant need for acceptance and all that all that business. I will say, though, I was like in the arcing toward cooldom,
00:04:25
Speaker
um The name bully heart is much more of a personal moniker having to do with a health issue
Band Identity and Personal Struggles
00:04:33
Speaker
I had in my 20s. It had made such an enormous impact on my life in positive and negative ways and um the bully part was is it's sort of an ambivalent word where it could it could also mean positive and negative things. um Like having a heart that bullies you is a burden. And then people over across the pond say things like, oh, oh, it's so bully. It's so bully, meaning it's so great, it's so good. So I thought after like eight months of trying to figure out what to call my band, and I'm online, like looking at all of these names, like, oh, what about this name? or but And everything is taken.
00:05:08
Speaker
of course, like that I wanted. um In the middle of the night, I just had this sort of inspiration to put these two words together and make it my name. And it was funny because even at the time I was like, this is a really good name for me because it's really appropriate. And I was like, it's not as cool as I want it to be. This is my name. Like I knew it. I knew it somewhere deep in my bones. I was like, this is the name of my band. And the it's going to be cool when you embrace it. You know, yeah that's all that's all there is to it. Yeah, it's a unique name. It's memorable. I think it works. And like like you mentioned, you actually kind of bring this up on your podcast a little bit, um your your health issues. You were actually in a coma for a minute. I was for for a couple of days. I was because my i my whole body was ah infected. i I was undergoing sepsis because i had my heart was infected, and so all of my blood was infected. So I had a fever of around 106, almost 107. So yeah, i was almost I was really at death's door. Yeah, I was almost there.
00:06:07
Speaker
And you were telling me last week it kind of it kind of changed the trajectory of of your your creative path at least to to some degree. It did, because at the time, um so I came to l LA, I'm originally from Evanston, which is just outside Chicago. Yeah, okay. And yeah, a Midwestern girl, um yeah born and bred. I wonder, we didn't talk about this last week, but i after we got off the phone, I'm like, I'm picking up a Midwestern vibe. So I grew up in Griffith, Indiana, which is right next to Gary, which is, you know, Chicagoland. Less than an hour away from me, yeah. yeah i like My dad worked in the city, like all of it, yeah.
00:06:41
Speaker
Yeah, so I came to L.A. to go to school. I came to go to UCLA and I graduated with a theater degree and then had a great time in college and I figured, oh, I'm not going to stick around this crazy place. I don't understand the city. It doesn't feel like home. But I'll just like dip my toes in. You know, I was doing improv comedy. I was doing sketch. I was doing ah pilots like comedy pilots and small indie films. And I was like, I'll just write it out for a bit here. and and You know, maybe eventually I'll go back to Chicago to do theater or I'll go to New York.
00:07:11
Speaker
um And then that just never happened. you know like yeah um That was sort of a combination of my my life. just but you know I started to lay roots down here and I started to really get it here and really understand it. And I also met um my boyfriend in my early 20s was a sound engineer.
00:07:31
Speaker
And so he brought me into the studio to make demos. you know Making music at that point was a hobby for me, because you know I was all about being an author and out you're in a working actor. um And he was like, well, you've got these great songs and this great voice. Why don't we just lay them down? you know So I was doing both.
00:07:51
Speaker
And the heart infection sort of signaled to me once I got through the like whole month in the hospital and then the few months after, it took me almost about a year plus to fully recover from my body to really, really um to bounce back from that massive infection. I realized that Hollywood was killing me. It's not that I didn't love acting. I didn't love the craft and the work of it.
00:08:18
Speaker
But I just, I couldn't find a place there and it just was it it was her it just hurt too much. yeah So um I turned to music because I was like, well, if I'm going to be broke, you know I might as well do something I love. and yeah you know And something that I can take agency over a little more, something I can do. I don't have to wait for the thundering.
00:08:39
Speaker
That's as funny. You mentioned if I'm going to be broke, I'm going to do something that I love. i kind of I had a similar thing. I kind of watched my dad. We were never, and we did we filed a solidly lower middle class, but you know I saw my dad kind of coming home every day from work and being miserable. And I'm like, we don't we're not rich. like He's miserable. like'm I'm going to do something I love. And you know if i'm if I'm going to be broke, I might as well not be miserable. Right, right. Find the joy somewhere. And I think there's i think that's why a lot of us ah artists allow ourselves to to do our art. But yeah, I also feel like the flip side, sometimes that can drive people away from their art because you can take something that you love. Like for me, it sort of crushed my love for acting for quite some time because you can take something that gives you joy and and drain it of all the joy yeah then realize sure and then realize like,
00:09:34
Speaker
but you You got to pivot. you know um I didn't find my way back to acting until about six or seven years ago where I just i decided to get back in because I was like, I miss it. ah I don't have the same need. to It doesn't have to pay my rent anymore. you know I'm a whole different character. I'm a whole different you know ah product from the marketplace point of view. And right and so that's been fun to to dip my toe back in.
00:10:01
Speaker
yeah I was a working actor for exactly one summer after I graduated college. how you got of tell me what happened yeah yeah so why I basically just did summer stock theater in Brown County, Indiana. so I technically got paid to act, but it i mean it was no there are no and There are no small roles, only small actors, but it was a very small role. really and then i yeah And then I ended up getting going to Indianapolis. And like you were mentioning, you kind of you kind of get stuck in the rhythm of a place and friends and social. And and and before I knew it, I lived in Indianapolis for a decade. And I'm like, what what happened? you know and Then I came out here. and but Were you doing acting at that point? or did you No, I went pretty quickly after after that first summer. um I think I always, like you thought, well I'm going to end up in Chicago. i love I love Chicago. I still to this day love the city. Me too. I can identify it with in a lot of ways. but i i just never i What happened was I followed a girlfriend who had all he would graduated before me.
00:11:00
Speaker
um to Indianapolis and a handful of people in my class went there too. So I was theater and drama and telecommunication. So i've I've been hedging my bets basically since the beginning. Right. You had that backup plan. Yeah, exactly. which like if i If I'm talking to anybody in their early 20s now, I'm like, don't have a backup plan.
00:11:19
Speaker
like and Because if you have a backup plan, you're gonna you're gonna fall, you probably like me, you're gonna fall into it really quickly. And it's worked out, I've had a nice career until this year, this gun down the tubes, Hollywood. Hollywood will come back. and Yeah, no, it's it's on it's on the way back. I don't know if, did did I tell you, ah my husband is a TV show runner, so I've been proximate i've been proximate to Hollywood for a long time. He's a raise a screenwriter, he's done films, mostly television though.
00:11:47
Speaker
um And fun fact about my husband, he also followed his girlfriend who had graduated a year earlier. Yeah, you college and was a theater major at you. I don't know. Yeah, that's why. Yeah, that's a wild. So what I wanted to talk about on this podcast, though, and the central question that we try to ask essentially is how do you write a song? So now that you've gotten through, you know, you found your creative path in your You've made it through and and you're focused on songs. how how do you What's your creative process? How do you write a song?
Songwriting Process and Influences
00:12:20
Speaker
Songwriting for me is is always like an evolving um process.
00:12:26
Speaker
So at first it came mostly from, I would say, writing poems and sitting down at the piano. The song starts on the instrument. And usually starts with me um sort of screwing around with ideas. Like that's one way in, is that I'll sit down and I'll just screw around with some chord ideas. And sometimes I'll land on, ah either I'll land on a hook or I'll land on a chord progression I like, or I'll land on just a piece of a song and I'll go, oh, that's cool. I want to remember that. you know So I'll either write it down or I'll record it quickly into my phone or something.
00:13:03
Speaker
um And I would say half of the time, those ideas become something eventually, whether they become something that week or that day or the next month, sometimes even, gosh, sometimes even years later, although usually it's pretty, usually it's pretty, it's pretty immediate. um And then half of those ideas just go by the wayside and then ever get developed. um So I think primarily that's how I've been writing songs. I usually will come up with the med the melody after the chords, and then I'll play it for a while and try to figure out what does this song want to be called? Like, what's the voice of the song, right? What is the song trying to say? um That to me is the easiest way in. But every once in a while, either I've been on assignment, like, oh, you need to write a song about this.
00:13:50
Speaker
Or you need to write a song that sounds like it was made in this year. um I don't do that very often, but every once in a while like I do write songs for reasons. And and that's tricky. Like like on assignment, as as you just you just decide I'm going to write a song about this thing or or what do you mean? sometimes it's Yeah, sometimes it's my own. I put myself on on ah on the hook and then I've also written songs. ah like I wrote a song for my husband's play that opened last year and it needed to be about a particular thing and it needed to sound like it came from the 90s.
00:14:25
Speaker
um I've written songs specifically for other people's indie films a long time ago, like, oh, this needs to be, this needs to be a love song, but it can't say this, but it has to say this, but it needs to have, you know, it's like, it's making a cake, you know, like, it needs to have this kind of flavor and palette and this sort of energy to it. um Again, I don't do that very often, but I have done that a couple of times. And I find that But that's not organic to me. I know people who do that. you know That's what they do. you know yeah um And I think that's a super amazing skill. It doesn't come naturally to me. I'm much more into the like, just pull it from thin air. Not a person. um I think for me, those those the the pull it from thin air, and it's not really thin air. It's it's it's the decades of life experience. correct yes it's It's just kind of swimming. and just yeah You channel it. Yeah, but it is it does come from the 10,000 hours or whatever that you put in. But yeah, yeah sometimes you're like, yeah, I don't know where that came from. That's great. I know where it came from. Yeah. Yeah. But I do. I also do like the deadline. Like I've been I've done a couple different rounds of I don't know if you've heard of this, this, you know, there's a guy I love called Bob Schneider from Austin, Texas. And he's a songwriter. He does this thing called The Game, where he'll throw out a word or a phrase to a you know handful of songwriter buddies of his. And and everybody in the group has to take that word or phrase or mood or whatever, whatever the
00:15:50
Speaker
Constraint is and you've got a week to write us on That's a super cool idea. Yeah. so And i've done that I've done that a couple of different times. For my record that I released in 2019, literally half the songs on that record came from something that I did. so like i they don't Like you're saying, they don't all turn out. like Sometimes it's it's too forced, and it sounds like, what is this? What is this? No. But other times, it's a good combination, and it it gives me the kind of the kick in the pants that I need to to find whatever that is that's floating here from the 10,000 hours and go,
00:16:21
Speaker
Oh, oh, that. Yes. Okay, that works. Right, right. And then you're on right. And then you're on to something like, yeah, yeah. Because there definitely is that moment where like, I would say the last year of my life, um roughly a year, has been pretty fallow, because I sort of sat down and was like, Oh, and, ah you know, I haven't really I haven't spent a lot of time in the music room. And the time that I have spent in in this room here, I I've mostly just been diddling, just trying to so stay in relationship with my instrument and stay in relationship with my voice. But again, I'm like, eh, I'm not really channeling. I don't really need it. It doesn't have to come. I feel like that's finally starting to change. But you do help yourself by, like ah like you took on someone else's rubric or taking on ah an exercise like that is really cool. I also find co-writing is really awesome.
00:17:13
Speaker
at times, the older I've gotten, the more I like co-writing with people who are um less and less like me, like who's yeah oh yeah who yeah whose ah ways of writing, because then i I stretch more and I learn more. yeah sure I almost always get something out of it, whether it's like ah a chord that I'd never played before, you know or like a way of playing my guitar, or a way of um putting a melody line on top of a of a chord pattern or whatever, just a different like vibe. It's all helpful.
00:17:49
Speaker
at the end of the day, right? So how do you how do you get into that? like i I haven't done a ton of co-writing. My first band was called Paging Rim, and we had two records. And there there were we were basically myself and my my good friend Aaron. And we were both we both would bring our own songs to the band and work them up that way. And then we we got together one time and and tried to co-write a song together. And it was just this kind of like middling, you know, mushy, nothing. And I haven't, I haven't done a ton. And there's been a couple other sessions, but I just, I can't find my way in for into that, for so whatever reason, and I and I and I would like to, I just don't know how. So how do you how do you find your way into that? Do you structure your, your sessions like, um, in the beginning,
00:18:37
Speaker
of my career in the 90s, I actually had a lot more of a um like an infrastructure behind me. I met people through um my boyfriend and his career, and i and I met people through doing a bunch of open mics out here in l LA, and then I started gigging. And so um i had I had someone who is interested in signing me for a deal and publishing and so they hooked me up with some people um that of course the record deal never came to fruition I've only made my records but um but I got to meet some people that way also got to meet some people that I just went.
00:19:17
Speaker
to this place called Highland Grounds a long time ago, um which no longer exists sadly, but there was a great open mic, like a really high-end open mic um every week that I used to go and meet people and sort of, you know, flirt artistically with people to try to, you know, we were all we were all hungry to make it. yeah And part of that is, yeah, it's just networking. So I did the best I could to try to find like minded people and and write songs. um So in the beginning, it was easier that way. it It just sort of came organically. And then as I've gotten older,
00:19:56
Speaker
and even more DIY in terms of like, well, no, I do my thing with the people that I've met. I've had to actually really get more proactive about reaching out to people and co-write. To be honest, it's been a while since I've taken on a new ah writing partner and I'm actually overdue but for it because it could help me maybe like shake myself out of this. Yeah, for sure. Shake you out of a writer's block or whatever.
00:20:23
Speaker
So we talked a little bit about Land of the Living, which is your most recent release, um which I want to say, what did I write down here? The whole album is very dramatic, very, very cinematic and dramatic. thanks um And what here's a random thought I had. um I would go see.
00:20:43
Speaker
Land of the Living the Musical, is all I'm saying. and oh okay it's very just It's very, very story cinematic based. You don't even know what a huge compliment that is to me. yeah yeah And my co-producer, Dan McMates, who you hear talking on my podcast. Because before we worked on that project, right before, like 2020, where things were shut down,
00:21:10
Speaker
And, um, I was trying to figure out what to make after we had, Oh, that's your, that's your COVID record. we Yeah. Well, land of the living is my COVID record. Yeah. yeah okay oh thats yeah yeah He and I had released Queen Mab in 2018, which is all sort of thematically about like that teenage feeling. Hence Queen Mab. Queen Mab is a, is a reference to, um, Mercutio's speech Romeo in the beginning. Right.
00:21:38
Speaker
And he talks about how Queen Mab hath been with you, meaning like you know Romeo was all like smitten over Roxanne, this woman named Roxanne before he fell in love with Juliet. ah huh And his his friends were like hanging out with him in the square making fun of him. like you know You're so pussy whipped kind of thing.
00:21:58
Speaker
And queen Queen Mab was the fairy that everybody sort of attributed that energy to, right? Like a cupid. Yes, like a trickster. Yeah, well, like a cupid, like a trickster cupid too. Like she's an interesting, um she's an interesting flickers in the thick of it.
00:23:14
Speaker
Right, so that was the umbrella record that Dan and I put out in 2018 and then i and I was like, well, what what am I doing now? And the two of us, because we come from where we come from, his musical background,
00:23:27
Speaker
My musical background as an actor, and I used to do a lot of musicals as a kid, and I loved musicals, and my parents loved listening to them. And so it was really in my, they were in my ears early on. We were like, let's write a musical. We were going to write a rock opera. And I was like, we can do this. We're going to do this. You know, because I've got, I've got sort of the story and the song in, you know, that's, those are my tools and his tools are, you know, he's,
00:23:56
Speaker
he's got all the music theory and he can score. you know So we're like, we're going to write this musical. And then out of that, you know you think you think you're headed in one direction and then something else happens, right? And then out of that came this idea also, and I was like,
00:24:12
Speaker
sitting around at like four o'clock in the afternoon. Because it's the pandemic, I have nothing to do. Like four o'clock in the afternoon drinking rosé and like watching crime TV, right? Yeah. All of us middle-aged white women. and And I was like, wait a minute. Hold on. What if? And then I started sort of writing these songs about murder and about, ah you know, like my imagination took me there. And then the musical idea got kind of you know, shelved for a bit. But we did end up creating songs, ah I think, in that cinematic vein or in that um musical storytelling vein, because that's what we initially had wanted to do together. So I'm so glad that you picked that up. That makes it like so heard. So awesome. Thank
00:25:44
Speaker
Because I'm DIY and I'm paying for everything. A lot of it's on a shoestring budget and I'm always pretty amazed at what we can come up with for you know as little as as it eventually ends up costing, like in the yeah and the grand scheme. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I run into that too, the whole budget thing. like you know It's this push-pull between you know It's like we're not in our 20s anymore. I'm not trying to make it. right and And in the same way that I was trying to make it in my 20s. I mean, at this point, I'm just trying to fill a room occasionally. Right, me too, man. I mean, that's been like my whole 25 years I've been. And now I'm like, hey, you know what? I'm filling a room. I'm succeeding. Like 15, 20 years ago, I was like, ugh, it's got this gotta to get bigger. And now I'm like, wait, wait. You know what? I'm actually kind of killing it.
00:26:34
Speaker
Yeah, like that's great. But yeah, but I mean, I hear you too. I always want to pay people what they're worth, which is, which is really difficult when you just don't have, oh so crazy you want to make it you know, you want to at least make it a project that they're going to want to work on, you're gonna, that's gonna be fun for them that they can feel, you know, get them in and out real clean and easy. yeah You know, you just don't want to make it a hassle for anybody. Yeah. No, you're no you're not paying them what they're Absolutely. Yeah, I did not do a great job of that in this in this last go around. I missed, you know, you're talking about the collaboration that you have with with ah with the ah Dan and Charlie. What was the other guy? Charlie, yeah. And that's that's so important. And this last record that I just put out, I'm proud of it and ah proud of the product. And and I was able to you know get some a good amount of help from very talented friends. But
00:27:24
Speaker
I think reflecting not a little too much of it was done in this room, sitting at this desk, looking at that screen. a little a little just it was It's a little too insular, and I can already tell. like i'm already kind of I just put it out in June, but i'm already like I'm ready for the next one, and I want to get in a studio, and I want to spend some money, right and and and bounce ideas, and I want more input from from my creative friends instead of just like,
00:27:49
Speaker
hey, do this this way and this this way. So that that collaboration is is important. Totally, I agree. And i and just just to reflect back to you, first of all, I've listened to a bunch of it before i got on the before I got on this podcast. And I think it sounds really, really good. I don't think it sounds like you did it right here in this room by yourself. It sounds a lot more expansive and professional to me. So kudos to you. yeah Sounds great. I think it's a fantastic um take on your own version of like a pop indie rock, it's really cool. You got some hooks, there's a lot of catchy stuff. I think it sounds great, number one. yeah and Number two, i think i mean I only learn through doing and then making mistakes. right yeah you know You learn the most through making mistakes. and I look back on the whole trajectory of my recording life. from you I started in 1999 really, recording. yeah
00:28:45
Speaker
um other than the demos that I've been doing earlier. and i mean i so I hear all the glaring errors. in i head totally there so many There's so many things I would redo. you know There's so many songs that I would ah maybe give another edit to, you know like, oh, that song wasn't ready to record. or Oh, we know absolutely. Or, oh, no, I know i wouldn't have i I wouldn't have used that instrumentation. I wouldn't have arranged it that way. I wouldn't have had you know um i i would have subbed out another song in the collection. I mean, there's so many mistakes to make. yeah But ultimately, at the end of the day, like that's that's how you become who you are. you know yeah Essentially, your albums or your whatever your singles or whatever you're recording, it it ends up just being a snapshot of who you were as an artist and a songwriter and a performer at that.
00:29:34
Speaker
at that time. That's right. and what And what you knew, what you had access to and where your creative juices were flowing. And, you know, um I mean, I think in a way, it's also kind of a it's a privilege and a burden to be DIY because pretty much every decision that was made on my records was ultimately up to me. You know, like I didn't have I didn't have you know, record people breathing down my neck ever. oh So that, you know, I have to pat myself on the back, but then there's also no one else to blame. and When you look back and you're like, yeah well i said that's, yeah, that could have been better. yeah But you are where you are at every point.
00:30:24
Speaker
yeah So i did I did dig into your to your little companion podcast that you did yeah after Land of the Living.
Concept Album Creation and Themes
00:30:33
Speaker
um And i kind of I haven't listened to all of it, but I've listened to a lot of it. so Well, I really appreciate that. I mean, yeah you know for a podcast of like a couple of musicians sitting around talking about making music, it feels kind of niche to me. you know So yeah I'm always super appreciative when people tell me, oh, yeah, I listened to a couple of episodes. It's really interesting. And you know I'm like, great.
00:30:53
Speaker
that's great yeah Yeah, it's definitely niche, but it's like so perfectly kind of my niche. I mean, more of the digging in of the songs and the and the and the you know the study behind it rather than the murder part, although that's intriguing too. um Well, yeah sure. that you know that was part of the That was part of the draw for me to to create it. I mean, it was organically bubbling up in me anyway, but I thought, i thought hey,
00:31:16
Speaker
people may actually dig this. Yeah. So that's the last, the most recent thing you put out into the world was that Land of the Living. Land of the Living. Yeah. Did you see how hard it was for me to... I actually had trouble saying it a number of times. Yeah. It's one of those things that it does not trip off your tongue. But yes, that was the last piece of collective music that I put out in the world.
00:31:40
Speaker
i have I'm working on a couple songs right now. I may put out a single next, we'll see. um But yeah, I've really taken quite a breather in the last year um having to do with just my own my own personal life. And that was such a push. I put out that album and I put out the podcast and I put out an accompanying video um that goes along to the first song, which is called Hangman.
00:32:06
Speaker
And that's all about the detective voice. And then I made quite a major push with that in terms of entering it in a bunch of festivals. And we actually won a couple of best video awards last year. So I felt like I had done my duty with the project and the concept. um And then I just kind of sat down and took a breath. And I'm still rising up out of that breath. Yeah, I bet.
00:32:30
Speaker
yeah I bet. Yeah, I've i've seen the video ah too and the video is is also incredible
00:33:10
Speaker
You mentioned hooks too, and that's kind of the one of the things that's stuck out to me from pretty much everything that i' that I've heard of yours to this point is
00:33:22
Speaker
And it's specifically highlighted when you're talking about a ah very specifically hyper-targeted theme record like you made, the murder record, um you still did a really great job, I think, of the story basically exists for the most part in in the verse lyric. And then you you yeah were able to craft it so that the hook, the chorus becomes a little more universal, and it's not just this specific thing. And there's there's definitely a craft to that. There's a quote that I like to go back to a lot that I hopefully employ. ah The verses are the blues, and the chorus is the gospel, right? I like that. I think I've come this far to maybe never hear that until you just laid it on me.
00:34:07
Speaker
um But yeah, but you did a ah great job specifically on that record of of of doing that. And I mean, obviously that's intentional, I'm assuming. Thank you. Well, yes and no. i mean I would say also i got I gotta add something about the bridge. I don't know that I can i don't know if i can follow along that particular ah metaphorical path, but I can say that um I use bridges a lot, if unless they're just musical. But if I have lyrics and a bridge, usually a bridge is like, okay, let me just let me just tell you exactly what's going on. Yeah, totally. That's exactly how I use a bridge. Same way, yeah.
00:34:42
Speaker
like In case you're a little bit confused, yeah listen to this. like here Here's what's happening. yeah and Bridges are a little out of favor these days too and in yeah popular music. Yeah, I have noticed. Well, there's a whole bunch of stuff about popular music. that yeah There's a lot of it that I dig and a lot of it that I just don't get at all. No, same. When I was toying with creating this podcast and I didn't have a name for it yet, one of one of the possible names was, does do we need a bridge?
00:35:08
Speaker
And, you know, it was kind of along those lines because like you Yeah, I put a bridge in almost every song almost just because this is how I write a song, you know, first chorus, first chorus bridge chorus out, you know, so it's like Yeah, and me too. And I do find that I lean back on that structure quite a bit. Though I've been very, I'm proud of myself to have broken out of that when I can break out of it. Because some of my, I would say some of my strongest songs don't necessarily follow that format. Like, oh, there's never a chorus. It's just an A section and a B section. Do you know what I mean? And I do hear a lot of that.
00:35:51
Speaker
out in the world too. yeah and i and i And I appreciate that because we don't necessarily need to have so much structure to do the storytelling, I think. um Also moving from like a singer songwriter into yeah trying to become this indie rock writer, it became really important to me that the song needed to sound cool huh even more than the story needed to be ah perfectly laid out. this like The sounding cool part, how does that manifest for you? Is that more production or is that like literally the words that you're choosing? It manifests in terms of the words and it manifests in terms of the words that I choose and don't choose because I because i think part of like some of my favorite songwriters, well in different genres, I like all kinds of music, but
00:36:46
Speaker
I really appreciate, let's I just pick somebody like Tracy Chapman, she comes to mind. um Less is more. you know She tells a story with such brevity, and I mean that that's from but totally comes from like the folk blues yeah you know bucket. But you know what she's saying, you know exactly what she's saying, but there's just not a whole lot of syllables.
00:37:10
Speaker
to get in the way of the vibe. And I feel like I would rather err on the side of somebody being like, wait, what, what is she saying exactly? As opposed to shoving too many words into a melody line because, you know, God forbid it would sound clunky and it doesn't sing well. You know what I mean? When you're like, when you're like, it just doesn't sound good. When I give myself, when I open up the parameters, I get more creative and I like what I write more.
00:37:40
Speaker
and it sounds better to me. You're you're saying with less restriction? yes well with Yes. With less restriction and more of a focus on it singing well as opposed to the audience. like The audience doesn't necessarily need to know exactly what I'm saying to me. I would rather have an evocative song make somebody feel something as opposed to like, oh, this is a story that they know exactly what happens with every Well, you hit on it. It's the it's the make people feel something. So the yeah the specific words are less important if you are able to translate that emotion and have and and have that effect.
00:38:16
Speaker
I think the thing I'm trying to get toward the mastery is someone who chooses the right words. I think the word choice is really important actually, but I think having too many words sometimes can keep the way of just letting the feeling shine through. That's kind of the push-pull you're working through a lot of times is finding that right balance. and Oh, I mean, a good rule of thumb for me sometimes is like is like, even though I don't sound like, nor do I ever nor do i want to sound like, say, the Stones, right? Love the Stones. Who doesn't love the Stones? I'm not trying to sound like them, but every once in a while, you know when I'm struggling with like, ah sometimes just good, just go and listen to like a fucking rock and roll song. Like listen to Mick Jagger. Listen to how much is said and not said, you know?
00:39:05
Speaker
um and then And then I'm like, then I can try and balance in my Tom York and my David Bowie and my Peter Gabriel. like then i can Then I can start to bring in the poetry, but I need to make sure that there's like rock and roll there. yeah Otherwise, and I have tons of songs on my Holly Long Records. There's so many songs where I'm like,
00:39:23
Speaker
Oh my God, so many words. I'm singing so many words. Yeah. I'll get that a lot when I listen. When I come across a song that I've heard and I go, holy shit, that is the most simple way to convey that emotion. And it was the most efficient way to say it. And it nothing was flowery. It was just, it's just there it was. And like, I will listen to a song like that sometimes I'll be just, you know what?
00:39:48
Speaker
I'm out. I'm done. I can't do that. like like like They can't possibly get any simpler than that. I listen to Dawes a lot, Taylor Goatsmith. He does that a lot. um I found this song recently called, um the you know it's called Universe by Annika Bennett.
00:40:04
Speaker
um And it's one of those it's just like the most gorgeous melody and such as so just a simple observation of of her her little moment in in time figuring out how to capture that simplicity. I've certainly gotten better at it over, you know, my five records that I put out.
00:40:20
Speaker
um you know getting to that point and getting getting to the gospel part of the chorus and and leaving and and honing the blues part so that it's less and less. Here's all me spoon feeding you every little syllable and perfect little thing. No, leave some space. Leave some space for the listener that's right to to bring their own.
00:40:40
Speaker
Yes, exactly. right like leave Sometimes leave some space for ears, but also i'd leave some space for people to infuse your song with what they think it's about. yeah Then your song becomes about not just what you wanted it to be about, but it becomes about what they think it's about. Exactly. yeah know Because that's i mean that's the whole point of connecting with art, is to reach someone else's life experience and touch upon that.
00:41:07
Speaker
It's almost like handing them a coloring book, right? Here's here's here's the outline, but you you you fill it in with the color and the and the shading and and you you'll fill in the the scene and you know whatever. here's yeah you can tell You can kind of tell what the picture is, but you can make it as deep or as simple as as you want it to be as as a listener. and Yeah, that's that's the trick, right?
00:41:30
Speaker
I'd love to say that as I'm getting older, just like every song I write just gets better and better, but it doesn't work that way. right so you know Sometimes you're like, you get closer to that moment and it feels really like, wow. i when I feel like I've channeled something really good, I feel very humble. Like, wow, that was of me and not of me. Then I'll just write a couple, two or three, just other shitty things. Like, oh man, I thought I had it. I had my handle, I had the butterfly right on my hand. Oh, I'm clenching again. I wanted to pet it and it flew away. Yes, yes, that's good. Yeah, it reminds me of,
00:42:13
Speaker
I've written a ah song or two, and I think it's the cheesiest thing I've ever written in my life. hu And I'll play it for somebody, and it it almost gets a more positive reaction than than the stuff that I've written that I really think is profound and and deep and is going to connect on some emotional levels. it's Oh, that's interesting. Yeah, yeah. There is no uncool, by the way. like There's no bad. There's no like Oh, that's not, that's not okay. Do you know what I'm saying? Yeah. Does this make any sense? I do feel like- Yeah, it totally makes sense. I haven't, I'm not sure I've gotten to your place yet. I'm, you know, I haven't, I'm still, I'm still trying to chase cool to a degree, but like- Well, I mean, I'm, I'm always chasing cool, but I think I realized that I've just opened up the definition. Yeah.
00:42:57
Speaker
I mean, maybe maybe cool cool isn't the right word, but the next level, like, ah, it's like whatever it is, it's just out of reach, right? Like I'm constantly like, ah, got I got it. No, that went other you know I keep, yeah I don't know. There's just something, and which I guess is a good thing. You kind of want to continue to have that drive and push for the next level. but Well, totally. I mean, and and it's all it's all of the process.
00:43:22
Speaker
Yeah, right and right. And I feel like maybe we we also will cyclically go back into those spaces. I mean, I'd like to think so. I'd like to think that some master songwriter, some like Leonard Cohen didn't know what he was doing all the time. Like, I can't imagine. No, of course not. It's just a matter of output, too, right? You know, Leonard Cohen probably wrote a song, at least a song a day, if not more. You know, I've i've seen this Dolly Parton meme, I don't know how many hundreds of times, but Dolly Parton wrote, you know, Jolene and the other song. um Yeah, wouldn't use the song. um Yeah. What's it called? um Anyway, you know what it's called. Yeah. She wrote those two songs on the on the same day. Yeah, apparently. Which is amazing. and No, completely amazing. what What doesn't get said is and during that part of her life, and she probably still, she's writing three, four or five songs a day. So like... Maybe, but yeah. yeah Yes. i Yeah, I agree. I agree because because the more
00:44:23
Speaker
the more you're greasing the wheels the more likely right okay totally agree with you first of all i'm an artist i'm not a content creator i don't create yeah content i'm never going right and this notion now i i see out in the like the spotify world and the whole is is pushing artists to to create every day. Oh, yeah, because you have to create every day. Otherwise you're not ah and you must create. And there's a part of me that's like, OK, that's bullshit. Yeah, because sometimes the best. Stuff just takes time and yeah, yeah, maybe if you sit down and write every day, maybe you'll write a song every day. Maybe you won't.
00:45:08
Speaker
Yeah, but that's okay because maybe in a month You'll actually write a good song, right? Do you know like I I just yeah notion of like the kind like the neurotic need to constantly output yeah I think that works against really mocking your own voice. I think where we're at now where you where there's ah constantly an algorithm that you have to feed with different stuff that isn't just you expressing emotionally in the craft that you know how, i.e.
Authenticity in Artistic Expression
00:45:39
Speaker
songwriting. I mean, hell, I'm i'm doing it right now with this. This part of the reason of this podcast is like, hey, let's put more stuff out into the world. I love that. And I enjoy it. And obviously, these conversations are, I love to have these conversations. But
00:45:51
Speaker
But that's organically part of your process. You do that because that's who your that's your artist that's what your artist wants to do, which is part of why it's so good. It's part of why this podcast is really good. you know If you were just doing this because you had an idea that maybe this was going to further your career. you know it would it would not resonate. yeah you know Also, as long as you're being authentic, even with whatever you're putting out into the world. i mean ah you know right That is the $10,000 word right there. That's true. Authentic. Yeah. right um Because you you have some stuff on your Instagram that I've connected with, so you you watch the bear. Oh, yeah. I love it. Which is fantastic. I just finished season three. Like that first episode of season three, how some network executive let that go to air with hardly any dialogue is fucking amazing to me i know and gorgeous. And someone was like shitting their pants when they got that first cut and they went, wait, where's all the dialogue? But so such an amazing show. But anyway, um you you kind of and don't I don't know if you remember that.
00:46:54
Speaker
You know, you kind of did a little monologue to your thing, but um let me remember that you wrote this. My intention to share to connect in a world overrun by sparkly appearances of connectivity. It's kind of what we're talking about, right? Like it's that constant like feed the algorithm and all the social development stuff. Yeah, I'm on the pursuit of less shiny, more mundane, real true. And that like, yeah, I can thoroughly and ah get that. And like, yeah, that's kind of where we're at. And it's it's that's the Yeah, you want to get to the authentic part, the emotional release part, the connecting with the person on the other side of of the, you know, black mirror and and not just that's anim amazing stuff out there. Yeah. so good ah You know, there there are all sorts of wonderful things that we gain access to because of social media. You know, I'm not going to paint it all black, but I'm trying not to pretend.
00:47:47
Speaker
and I'm trying not to merchandise myself all the time, and I'm trying not to sell, and I'm trying, I don't. It's such a fine line though, to be authentic and to not, yeah, merchandise yourself. Yeah, well, because you do want eyes, you do want to be seen because you don't connect, you want to connect. I still want to fill the room, yeah. Yeah, truly. but But I do find that my reason for that has changed. I want to fill the room because I want to connect. I don't want to fill the room because I want to feel important. Yeah. Because I know that I'm not.
00:48:19
Speaker
and you know And that's become more and more okay with me. So I'm like, I'm so not important, but you know maybe some of the stuff that I'm thinking and feeling that feels kind of universal, maybe that's important. So I can be somebody that tries to says that tries to convey some truth because it's not mine, it doesn't belong to me. you know Anyway, so thank you for mentioning that particular ah sort of video diary piece on Instagram that I do now and then.
00:48:48
Speaker
and Of course, I'll put a filter over it, just so everybody knows. like I do my best to be very authentic, but then I'm like, oh, my skin doesn't look so good. Let me just make sure I look decent. You still gotta look good. i mean you know I've got the ring light and the nice camera and you know all of it. you know Yeah. I don't want to look like a cartoon version of me, but yeah. Right. No TikTok filter or anything with putting the artificial freckles on. That's right. sort Right. There's no like kitties like coming out of the back of my head. Speaking of the TikTok, I don't know if you're on TikTok too, but I'm I'm not, but don't because it's I know, but I'm very aware of it. and It's yeah so addictive. It's like just you know this, all nonstop. and like Even you know he say, oh I'm just going to look at TikTok for five minutes, and then 30 minutes later, I'm like, what am I doing? shit yeah just why Why am I watching like traffic stops? ah people beside i like this this The stuff that I will stop and watch, like what are you what is this?
00:49:47
Speaker
It's the most bizarre look into your brain. I don't even know. yeah no i mean too much about myself you like That's all of us. That's all our collective brain together. we ah you know you're You're not alone, man. you know just not oh i don't i don't I'm not a TikTok user, but I find myself doing that on Instagram.
00:50:09
Speaker
And then other people will send me videos that have come from TikTok. yeah And they're very funny or whatever they are. And then I find myself, then I'll then i'll get hooked based off of that stuff. yeah right right And then I also am like, wait, I'm watching traffic. Oh my God. like ah let's wear the phone Throw the phone. I was telling somebody, I get i still get the Sunday paper delivered as an actual paper. Me too. And I do it so that I know. High fiving you. yeah yeah right because yeah you're looking like no strikes me I need a reminder, a weekly reminder to put your damn phone away and and like have something tactile and like read something that wasn't specifically tailored to everything that you flick through. That's right, it's got spoon fed to you. Yeah, right. Totally. Yeah, I get to pick which article I'm gonna watch and which one I'm gonna skip and ah watch, read, whatever. Yeah, whatever you do with with your eyes.
00:51:03
Speaker
um yeah yeah I actually do the crossword too, so I like oh yeah like put pen to paper yeah like old people do. like I have another person calendar on my desk.
00:51:15
Speaker
So it's like, if it's not on my old person, like paper calendar, I probably won't show up to it. No, I still take notes on like an actual notebook, which is nice. I i like that tactile feeling of pencil and paper. I so i mean, I still do notes on iPad and whatnot too, but yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you so much for coming on. It's been a pleasure to talk to you. Yeah, you as well.
00:51:39
Speaker
I recommend everybody taking a listen to all your stuff, but specifically the murder records and a podcast that's super fun to listen to. Thank you so much. It's been my extreme pleasure. and Even if we weren't like hawking some of my music, I would still love to just talk to you. so This has been really fun. Yeah, likewise.
00:51:58
Speaker
Thanks for listening to Wilsbox SongPod. You've made it this far. Please rate, review, like, love, add, subscribe, do all the things on whatever app it is that you're hearing my voice. That lets the almighty algorithm know that interesting people like you like this show and will serve it up to other cool and interesting people. Wilsbox SongPod is produced by Wilsbox Entertainment LLC. Mixed, mastered, and edited by me, Tim Wilsbox. See you next time.