June 11, 2024 • 49 mins
"Genesis" the new work from RAYE discussed in this episode is out now: https://raye.orcd.co/genesis
RAYE is an English pop singer/songwriter whose debut album, My 21st Century Blues, snagged Album Of the Year at this year’s Brit Awards. One of a historic six wins that evening. For a 26 year old artist who's already survived a tumultuous ride through the music industry, the ceremony was a coup.
On today’s episode Justin Richmond talks to RAYE about how a quote from Nina Simone gave her the courage to take control of her career and she explains the inspiration behind her sprawling new, multi-part single, “Genesis.”
You can hear a playlist of some of our favorite RAYE songs HERE.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Pushkin Raised, an English pop singer songwriter whose debut album
My twenty first Century Blues snagged Album of the Year
at this year's BRIT Awards, but that was just one
of six total awards she took home that evening. For Ray,
who at twenty six, has already survived in tumultuous rides
(00:36):
through the music industry, the evening was a complete coup.
Ray started writing songs as a young girl growing up
in South London. By seventeen, she signed her first record
deal with Polydor Records and worked for the next seven
years as a songwriter. While writing songs for artists like Beyonce,
John Legend and Rihanna, Ray was also writing her own songs,
(00:56):
which her label refused to release. She was eventually able
to leave Polydor and in twenty twenty three independently released
her debut album to heaps of critical acclaim, kicked off
by her viral TikTok powered hit Escapism. Ray's vulnerability on
her album about her own struggles with self esteem, substance abuse,
and sexual assaults have proven to resonate deeply with fans everywhere.
(01:20):
On today's episode, I talked to Ray about her wild
journey through the music business. She explains how a quote
from Nina Simone gave her the courage to take control
of her career, how a ski trip in Utah helped
inspire some of her best songwriting ever, and about her
sprawling new single out Everywhere now called Genesis. This is
(01:41):
broken record liner notes for the digital Age. I'm justin Ritchman.
Here's my conversation with ray Man. Your Coachella set seemed
like it was really well received. I got to see
a bit of it. It was awesome.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
It was definitely really a special one for us. I
think it's the first time I've witnessed a crowd like
that for me in a festival in the States, you know,
So that was like a really special change. But it's
something I'm not used to out here.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
What felt different about that crowd?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Well, I think in America, like it's it's always been intimidating.
I think as a British artist, you know, the idea
of like performing in America anyways, just intimidating. And you know,
I've done quite a few, not loads, but a few
other festivals out here where you're like, right, we need
to win the crowd, we need to grow the crowd. Yeah,
(02:35):
so Coachella just I wasn't expecting it to be that full,
and people were really engaged and it was really special.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
This wasn't a case of you getting your music out
to a bunch of people at the festival. It's like
those were people are like now converted, like people are
Ray fans.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
Do you know what? I do have a habit during
during shows of really over analyzing everyone's faces. I feel
like at the beginning of the set, I was like, right,
I need I was like, right, I need to win.
I need people to get to know me, you know
kind of thing. And I always try and leave a
bit of space. We ended up taking a song or
two out so that I'd have more time to chat.
(03:12):
I like to have a little chat some people. She
needs to stop talking about. I'd just like to talk.
And I think also it's a case of maybe some
people have heard the songs or maybe the song that
started to cross over here, and they're like, let's go
and see what it's about. And I think my mission
is always during a performance, I just want people to
walk away and be like I would see that again,
(03:33):
or that was good. You know, That's my goal. Yeah,
and you can see people being one of you know,
people going from stern faith or just like watching with
no expression to being like okay, or do you know
what I mean, You're like way even they're doing it
and you're like okay, cool, Like you know, have.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
You discovered little things that you can do over the
course of a set to maybe like reliably win people over.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
I think honesty has always been something that's kind of important.
I've never really I don't really plan what I say.
I kind of keep the music. You know, we know
what we're doing within the songs, but even some of
the endings of songs we leave space, and I just
kind of like it to be as open as possible.
And I think sometimes when you're just playing songs and
(04:17):
not talking, people can't really get to know you. They're
just getting to know the music. So I think that's
an important thing as well. I like to try and
give a little back story behind whatever this song is
about or this moment, and just.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Being not a script your stage banter at all.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
No, So sometimes I'd be like, oh my god, why.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Did I just say that you halfway through targets, Like
what am I saying? Yeah? No, there is a lot
of that when am I going with that?
Speaker 2 (04:42):
I think I even did that. I was like, I
don't know why, I just told you that, let's move on,
you know.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Yeah, that's amazing. Yeah, the way the album came about
was kind of security's It wasn't a situation where you
were at a label. It basically there was a lot
of roadblocks if you want to just I guess walk
us through some of those.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Yeah, it's just not necessarily been as simple ten years
to get to this moment. You know. I was about
seventeen when I signed my deal, and I was with
a record label for seven years, and I think, yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
Can we name them? No? I mean, I mean, I
think it's on the record.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
And you know, I think being a British artist, it's
a very different world out there. I think it's very
dance orientated. There are formulas typically that are safer formulas
that you practice as a songwriter. You know, I started
in this game as a songwriter from the age of
fourteen is when I really took it seriously, and I
(05:47):
was doing sessions off school and stuff, and you kind
of learn really quickly. Okay, there's a formula to this,
you know, accessibility, repetition, symmetry, you know, the whole math spine,
the kind of the songwriting thing, and.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
How did that change your songwriting as a young Like
when you're fourteen, I imagine you're coming to it pretty pure,
like just probably just want to do express and eight yeah,
and then you're realizing there's like a formula. Did that
change your songwriting.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Opposed to like change? I think it's just almost a
world of just gathering skills. You know, when I started
writing songs, it was very much feeling and freestyling and
what felt right and being like, oh, I did a
lot of songwriting in Sweden. There's some incredible pop rous
songwriters out there, and I used to fly out for
a couple of weeks at a time and write with
all the producers and writers to anyone that would let
(06:34):
me in a session. And from that you're like, oh wow,
you know, it's not just whatever melody feels nice. It's like, okay,
we have a melody here. The end of the melody
is a little bit too complicated. This word doesn't roll
off the tongue as nice, you know, and chipping away
and sculpting something, so yeah, you know, they're all skills
that I'm really glad I acquired. And I think for
(06:57):
different artists and different sounds and different genres, you kind
of need more of one skill than another and stuff
like that. But within that space, you know, dance music
is huge at symmetry and maths and repetition and lyric
that everyone can relate to and easily digestible and stuff
like that. So I kind of, from a younger age
realized I had a knack at being persistent and chipping
(07:18):
away at something until the artist or the person I
was writing with was happy and.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
You could take whatever criticism that would come with a
version one.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
And when writing for someone else, it's not about you know,
my opinion to a degree, But you know, I'm a
people pleaser as well, So I'm going to make this song,
going to do it so they love it. You know,
it's all a performance as well. In another way, it's
kind of funny. But yeah, I think when that started
to cross over and bleed into what my label at
the time wanted from me, and the goal was selling
(07:50):
opposed to the art itself, did.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
You know that going in or was that kind of
a were you blindsided a bit by Oh?
Speaker 2 (07:57):
No, of course not. Yeah, nobody does. Yeah, it's a
real thing. You know that moment before you put pen
on paper. Everyone is so nice. They take you for dinners,
sell you a whole lot of lovely dreams and promises.
Like some of the things. I was like sixteen years
old when I started doing the rounds and some of
(08:19):
the things I heard, Oh my god, I'm not even
gonna run me on here, because but it's wild.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
What are you wear?
Speaker 2 (08:26):
Something like? You know this? We have this artist said artists.
I won't even name the name, but they've heard your music.
They've agreed to endorse you. If you sign with Vice,
you're going to have this. You're going to have that.
This isn't even this is just people just talk and
artists in this stage. No people will say anything to
(08:46):
get you to put your name on that piece of paper.
When you're sixteen years old from South London and you're
like in America doing meetings with these big, huge people,
it can absolutely just muddel your brain up and false
hope and a lot of lies, a lot of air
that's real. I was like, raw, this place is dark.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
How quickly after you put fended papers you realize that,
oh I just got bamboos.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Maybe I'd like to say a year in maybe Also
the guy who had signed me had then left, so
the dynamics changed pretty quickly after that.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
That's a pretty common story too, I think, I hear, yeah,
it is your support structure leaves and then you're kind
of left.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
There's actually a contractual clause called a key Man clause,
which artists should know about, and I didn't at the time,
but it means, you know, you get that clause put
into your contract, means if the person who signs you leaves,
that you have the right to terminate or move with them.
It's called a key Man clause, and it's just something
I wish I knew about when I was seventeen.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
To what extent were you happy with the early phases
and stages of your career like those first from like
sixteen seventeen to you know, a couple of years ago,
only a few years ago.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
Well, I think it was a tricky one because it
wasn't about my goals. It was about, you know, needing
to impress these people who basically have my career in
their hands. You know, they get to decide whether they're
going to promote something or they're not, whether they're going
(10:30):
to pause my timeline or help me move things along.
So you have to play ball, you know, and you
learn that pretty quick. Yeah, So I did my best
to do that. The goal always has been since the
day that I signed to now in my career, to
be an album's artist. I wanted to release bodies of work,
(10:51):
and I was really excited to be able to earn
the right to decide what music I wanted to share.
And it was kind of always presented that. You know,
when you have a song that's big enough and you've
earned an audience that's big enough and wants an album
from you, that you can do that.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
So, yeah, when did your debut album start coming together?
When did you record that?
Speaker 2 (11:14):
I would say maybe about four or five years ago.
Some of the earliest songs started coming together.
Speaker 1 (11:22):
What were the first few?
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Oscar Win in Tears was there for a long time
hard out Here, but the instrumental was made years ago.
But then I wrote a whole nother song on top
of it Worth It was an older one, yeah, A
couple of songs had just been around for a while.
Five Stars was an old one, yeah, and I had
the title about four years ago. It's funny because I
(11:45):
was going through some of my notebooks at home and
I found this notebook. It was dated like twenty eighteen
or something. It said my twenty first century Blues.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
So the title the ideas were forming for a while.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
Yeah. Do you remember why that title came to you?
Why that phrase came to you?
Speaker 2 (12:04):
I don't know completely. What I do know is when
I was a kid, maybe it was about four ten
years old, and my dad and my uncle we went
on a road trip. Basically, we drove through America. We
started in la and we went all the way through
to I think it was Atlanta. We ended somewhere and
we drove all through Nashville, We drove through New Orleans
(12:24):
and Louisiana. We like did our whole trip. And at
that time, everywhere we'd drive, we'd put on the local radios,
you know in the UK. You know, I've listened to
a lot of gospel and some of the greats, amazing singers,
but there was so much music and genres I've never
been exposed to. And I think I had a life
changing experience when I was in New Orleans, and it
was at a place called the Preservation Jazz Hall and
(12:48):
it was like a room, like one hundred and fifty
people coming to this room and there's just this band.
And I remember being sat cross legged on the floor.
I was sat right underneath this guy's trombone. I had
like spit flying in my face. She sat there like
wide eyed, just like.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
What is this.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
I'd never experienced anything like it. And it was just
a fusion of kind of jazz and the blues. And
I remember being like, whatever this is, I want a
part of that. And since then, I kind of my
tastes changed and I just wanted to know more and
understand more about this feeling, this kind of music. And yeah,
so although we barely scratch over any kind of blues
(13:28):
textures in this album, what I fell in love with
was the songwriting and how you know, we go to
these bars and you've got people playing.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
Be like.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
When I was a little boy, I went to school
one day and then I sat on a chair, no
just say you know what I mean? These stories and
each one was different. It was the same riff and
just all these stories and I was like, wow, so
this is their blues. And I was like, this is
(14:04):
deep and they're deep stories, moving stories, very honest and
transparent and clearful, and I fell in love. I'd always
had this idea if I wanted to make whatever my
version of the blues is, even though it's not necessarily
that genre, it's that candidness.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Well, and there's a bravado on a lot of your
you know. I don't know if it's like the whole album,
because there's some very vulnerable bits, but there is an
added to a backbone to this album for sure that
runs through it. And I love the book ends. It's like,
as you put it on, it's like you're being transported
to like a smokey jazz club, you know what I mean.
(14:41):
And and by the time it ends, you're right back there,
and then you're almost ready to play right over again.
And it's amazing to hear that that stuck with you,
and then that made it that far from child a
childhood road trip across the ten through from LA to
New Orleans and up that that stayed with you all
these years. It really did. After a quick break, we'll
be back with more of my conversation with Ray. We're
(15:06):
back with more from Ray, who referenced wanting to be
in an album artist. What were some of the albums
that you grew up on that were like the bed
rocks for you, like the ones that were like the
perfect records for you.
Speaker 2 (15:18):
My goodness. The first two albums that played such an
important part in my childhood was Alicia Keys The Diary
of Alisha Keys. That was a big one for me. Wow,
that was the first hard copy album I ever bought.
And then Who Is Jill Scott? Jill Scott? That blew
my mind? And I think also like being in the
(15:40):
UK and just again the stuff we was exposed to.
And then my uncle shout out. Uncle jose put me
on to this album. He started with a Long Walk
and I was listening to this song like she's just
talking with melodies. You know, you're used to hearing these
perfect rhyming couplets and everything being whatever, but she's just
(16:01):
like speaking to you like a conversation, and it was
so casual the way she would sing that entire album
blew my mind. Watching me, you know, she's like she's
talking about CCTV and people watching her like she's just
gone to the shop to buy some double or triple
A batteries. She's like checking and see where I go?
(16:22):
Who I be? How where with who I make my money?
Speaker 1 (16:26):
What is this?
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Excuse me? Miss may, I have your telephone number and
your social security She's like, who me? It's like literally
telling I was like, what is happening? It completely blew
my mind and I fell in love. So those were
like two really important albums in my childhood.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Yeah, I wanted to ask you about your relationship with
hip hop because it feels like there's a certain cadence
that you can get into sometimes that that would also
explain it a lot too, Like that kind of being
able to where it's like are you talking? Are you singing?
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Kind of doing both Jills Queen of that isn't it?
Speaker 1 (16:58):
And then sometimes you just like she'll be doing that
and then just take off to whoa Okay, I forgot
who was right?
Speaker 2 (17:05):
And it's also so free, you know with her. I
love her style of you feel like anything could happen,
do you know what I mean? It doesn't feel too perfect.
It just feels so authentic. And I've always loved her
about her the way she sings and performs as well. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Were you listening to a lot of hip hop too
growing up?
Speaker 2 (17:24):
Yeah? A fair amount. I mean I did get to
that age where like Party next Door was my everything
that's not really hip hop, but you know Drake the
Weekends Party next Door, you know that era we all
had where we're.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
All like, oh my god, going up on a Tuesday.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
Yeah, the Other Weekend's first album was was a big one,
the trilogy. Yeah, But in terms of like hip hop,
I don't know what kind of exposed to some different stuff.
I was exposed to a lot grown up and like
different family members as well.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Did you see Uncle Jose.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Yeah, he's actually lives in America. So my mum and
my uncle were both raised in Ghana. When they're about
twenty two to twenty three, mum moved to the UK
and Uncle Jose moved to America. And he's always been
so supportive as well, Like he bought me my first laptop,
(18:15):
my MacBook where I used to start making sessions on
garage band and stuff like that when I was about
thirteen for my thirteenth birthday, and so I started making
a lot of demos on there and it really helped
spark my passion for production and vocal production and just
making music in general. It's so funny because even though
none of us before me and my sisters had ever
(18:36):
practiced music. It was always the desire for it and
the passion for it was always in the blood. I'd say,
like my dad's dad, he used to write songs. He
used to want to be a songwriter professionally in a
little town in England, north of England, Yorkshire. He used
to write songs on record them onto tape and score
it out and write the lyrics, and he'd send a
(18:59):
box of tapes and the sheet music to record labels
in London, hoping that you know, someone might hear his
songs and like it. And I can't even be too
can But he did have a song stolen from him
that turned out to be really successful. But you know,
theres a lot of songwriters it happened for back in
the day. He didn't get credited and no one believed him,
(19:19):
and he had no way legally to prove it because
he didn't have the money to do that, and then
he gave up on his dream then and there. It's
so funny that I was a kid and I didn't
even know the story, and I'm like, I just want
to write music. So it's funny at that time, No,
I was like seven eight nine when I was like
making silly, weird poems and copying the melodies i'd hear
(19:44):
in the TV kids shows I was watching. And I
remember one time I was watching this like TV show
and I liked the melody. It was like this kind
of jazzy and I was about eight, and I pretended
that I wrote it, but I just changed all the words.
And then I went to dad, my dad, and I
was like, listen to this song I wrote, and he
(20:06):
was blown away, but I didn't tell him I'd stolen
the song and just change the lyrics to some terrible
lyrics about snowfalling and a Christmas song. It was so bad.
I like, how that still sticks with you somewhere, like
I'm afraid of plagiarism. But then I realized that's what songwriters.
Some songwriters do that, or it's sampling essentially.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
Yeah, way to get started, you know, like copy a
bit and the lyrics so you can figure out how
to do a whole class. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
But yeah, it's always been in the my family. We
love music. You know. I grew up in church as well.
My dad and mom used to sing. Mom used to
sing in the choir. Dad used to leave worship so
I grew up watching and listening to music being sung
every Sunday.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
In like in a church where you grew up, what
was leading worship? Like would that entails?
Speaker 2 (20:53):
It was like, I don't know, like it's not a
big church that maybe forty or fifty people, you know
in a church in Tooting in South London where I
grew up, and my mom and dad would.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Just sing so like a gospel choir.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
No, it's not big, like you know in America, you
guys have an amazing like huge production set ups, like
amazing music. You know, this is very like down to
earth from the heart, very.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Direct from you guys to God in the gospel.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
You know, come as you are mate.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
You know, did you listen to much gospel?
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Yeah, definitely, Yeah, growing up with a lot of Kurt
Franklin and Donnie McClerkin and some amazing music I was
exposed to from a really young age. And I think
about gospel as well, is it's just musically so complex.
I don't even think gospel gets enough credit for how
technically difficult it is to really execute those things. You know,
you have them mds live in the church on a
(21:58):
microphone like okay, we're going to chord four and then five. Hold, hold, hold,
we're going six to seven, don't. I'm like, this is
serious practice.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Oh for real, it's not joke. No, it's great. I
want to go back now. So you have a few
songs for my twenty fifth Century Blues. You're still with Polydor.
You're kind of getting the run around what happens next.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
The understanding from my perspective also was if I was
going to do an album, it would need to be
a dance album. So my twenty first Century Blues kind
of got put on the back burner and I was
working on a record I needed to hand in songs
one p fifteen bpm or above, like it needed to
be like that kind of sound. So, as far as
(22:44):
my constraints allowed, I set out to make an album
that I was going to call dark dance Songs, and
it was going to be minor. And I'd say the
closest thing I had to it was that black mascara
which I put on my twenty fifth Century Blues. It
was all this kind of I was trying to find
my compromise, and then yeah, it just ended up that,
you know, I had a new person who just joined
(23:05):
our team and started working as my day to day
and she was supposed to tell me we were in
the middle of a shoot for something else. You know,
I'm like maybe four or five months into writing this album,
and I'm becoming invested and I'm excited about what it's
going to be. And then she'd basically just said that
if this song you've just put out doesn't do good,
You're not going to be able to do the album.
It just got really messy, and I was just I
(23:28):
hit just a boiling point, a breaking point. I was
so angry and so frustrated and so pissed off. I
felt like just I was just getting treated so unfairly,
and I've been trying so desperately for the last seven
years to prove to them that I am a musician, Like, look,
I'm writing for this person, Like are you proud of
(23:49):
me yet?
Speaker 1 (23:49):
Like I was just so desperate who are you're writing for?
Speaker 2 (23:51):
At that time, you know, I had a good healthy
amount of cuts, you know, in the dance world and
with some girl bands and some solo artists, and I'd
been doing good things and every time I remember, every
time I get caught, I'd kind of want to tell
them and be like, look, look, I was just so
desperate for them to believe in me. Really, I've really
(24:16):
tried so hard to achieve that and I just failed.
So yeah, it just got to a breaking point.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Yeah so I know you sent a tweet out at
some point? Was that a spur of the moment thing?
Was that calculated like let me just try something here?
Speaker 2 (24:31):
Or what was the zero strategy and planning into that?
Not tell you? I just was like in my head,
what the F do I have to lose? Like I
have nothing to lose. I was at a point where
I was like, I would rather just be a songwriter,
like I've seven years is a long time, especially from
(24:51):
a kid, you know, and then that pressure of that,
I think it's a lie personally, but that pressure of
you know, when you're young, it's exciting and as you
grow up you're going to miss your window, especially as
a woman, like these lies you hear and Yeah, just
got to a place where if this is what it
is to be an artist, I don't want to do this.
I hate some of these songs I'm putting my name
to that. I'm out here smiling and returning her like
(25:11):
trying to sell this is like soul destroying, especially when
I'm like in love with my craft. I'm in love
with music. I was a kid when I decided to
dedicate my life to work in music and wanting to
pursue a career, and it was breaking my heart. It
was just making me so sad. Yeah, So I just
(25:34):
got to a point. We just moved house and I
was in my room. It didn't have a bed in it,
so I just remember being like on a block mattress
on the floor, and the only thing I had in
my room was a picture of Nina Simone and under
it it said a quote it's an artist's duty to
reflect the times. And I remember sat there in tears, like,
what the hell am I doing. I'm not doing anything important,
(25:56):
I'm not doing anything that feels right. Nina would be
so disgusted by everything I put to my name. She
would be like, ill get her out of my face.
I was like, what have I become like? And I
said no, no, no, and I just let it rip.
Speaker 1 (26:17):
That's a very needless, a long thing to do. Let
it rip. I mean, thankfully it all worked out. I suppose,
as the story goes from that tweet, do you guys
work something out so they let you go. Does that
go back to that clause the key man.
Speaker 2 (26:28):
No, I sadly never had that clause in my contract.
I think I just got so lucky in that people
decided to care about what I'd shared. And I think
probably there's also a lot of people unaware of all
the ins and outs of what goes on behind closed doors.
And I had a lot of news platforms in the
UK reaching out, wanting to have a conversation and wanting
(26:50):
to understand more about what's going on and what it
can be like for a lot of artists sometimes when
you're having difficulties on seeing eye to eye with the
teams that you're contractually bound to, and that became leverage
and I was able to be like, respectfully, let's leave
(27:13):
this here now and.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
Then you get to put out your album independently. Yeah.
I don't know that it could have worked out more
perfectly in the end.
Speaker 2 (27:21):
No, it's honestly how everything's turned out, is all I
can describe it as is a series of just miracle
after miracle. I think I was so overwhelmed at how
much music of mine was already out there in the world.
In my head, I was like, how could I possibly
change the narrative? In the UK, people see me as
a feature vocalist, a voice like, who's going to care?
Speaker 1 (27:45):
You know?
Speaker 2 (27:46):
I just got so ridiculously lucky and Escapism receiving so
much attention on TikTok and then all of its suddenly
getting pushed out to all these new ears and that's
the first they've heard of me, and that's so it
was so exciting and like, wow, you know, anything really
(28:06):
is possible.
Speaker 1 (28:07):
Were you shocked by the reception of Escapism?
Speaker 2 (28:10):
Oh? Completely, yeah. But I was also so happy because
I love that song. I remember when we put that out.
Oh my gosh, Like, if only people were going to
be able to hear this song that was my thing
in my head. I was like, oh, just if people
could just hear this song, you know. I remember me
and my dad was talking. I was like, Dad, could
(28:30):
you imagine, Yeah, if something crazy happened and Escapism just
went really big and became number one, we looked at
each other and we were like, ah, ha ha, that'll
never happened. I remember that conversation clear as day. I
was like, could you imagine? He was like, yeah, I
could imagine. That would be crazy right, and then bang.
Speaker 1 (28:52):
Fruish. Why did you write that song in Utah?
Speaker 2 (28:56):
Yeah? I did.
Speaker 1 (28:57):
What's the story on that?
Speaker 2 (28:58):
We took a road trip another road trip.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
I like, good for you.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
I like a car. I like a long drive. And
also it's good to get out of the city. I
think when you're in a city and you know, be
there or whatever, it can be distracting and you could
be like someone like do you want to do this?
La la la, and you just want to go somewhere
in the middle of nowhere where you're just in a
peaceful place and you just have to be present. It
was nice never No. All the two people I went
(29:26):
with are good at skiing. I'm not very good at
save only skied once before in the school trip. I
decided to join them for skiing in between writing, and
it was a disaster. These two are like cross country,
like off Pieced Mountain, freaking skiers. Yeah, they're like, don't worry,
we'll stay together, We'll go slow. I took a wrong
(29:46):
turn in black Run. What the only way is down?
Speaker 1 (29:50):
This?
Speaker 2 (29:50):
Whatever? Foot drop? Absolutely not?
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Whatuld you do?
Speaker 2 (29:53):
And my friend's screaming at me, like you have to
ski down? I was like bitch, I skiing down, I'm walking.
She's like free sure, And there's all these like four
year old kids like just gunning it down the hill.
Took me about an hour to get down. It was hell.
After that, I left them to it. I went sat
on the campfire near the entrance and just made friends.
(30:15):
But yeah, skiing, it's gonna be a while before I
go back there.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
Maybe take some time on there. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
But the songwriting was productive. We were there for seven
days and it was such a nice time and we
wrote basically the other half of the album that was missing.
It all started with titles. Titles are usually how a
song will start for me, So I had title Mary Jane,
environment and anxiety. Escape is body dysmorphia. So those were
(30:42):
my four titles. There was one or two more that
we wrote, but that didn't make.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
It Environmental Anxiety. Speaking of the Nina Simone quote in
artists duty is to reflect the times your I mean
is so intense. How did you capture that so well?
Speaker 2 (30:58):
We booked a log cabin and we were staring it
across it was like a mountain in some trees and
we were like, wow, that so beautiful. Was in the
morning and Mike Sabbath, the producer who I made this
album with. The guy is so eccentric. We got downstairs
and he'd made this little like oh no, no, it's
like weird like sound. He'd like morphed his voice to
(31:18):
sound like a chipmunk l whatever, and it's just looping
around and around and just playing these weird bells. And
I was like, Mike, you've lost your absolute mind, but like,
let's fucking go, do you know what I mean? And
we were looking at the view and we was like, damn,
like we're being so cruel to our planet. And we
just started on a tangent, you know. And I think
it's something a lot of us are worried about but
are powerless to really do any actual change, or it's
(31:40):
something that needs to come from our governments. Yeah, a
lot of people don't care.
Speaker 1 (31:45):
You kind of sum it all up and put a
bow on it in like three minutes and ten seconds.
It's like, yoh wow, like you kind of like distill
all the anxieties of kind of our world at large
and all the problems and issues and and Boris johnson'sn't cooking.
Speaker 2 (32:04):
We all know that's true, but come on, it seems
seems like it's true this article, yeah, which is so funny.
But they tested the sewage. I don't know who was
testing the sewage of the houzards of Parliament and they
found such a high concentration of cocaine in the sewage.
I don't even know if we should be talking about this.
(32:24):
But meanwhile, you're arresting kids with possession of smoking a
little bit of weed on the street, I mean, putting
them in jail for that. Meanwhile, you're all in there
doing coke. It's just not fair. None of it's fair,
is it.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
But I'm glad you're speaking to someone like you.
Speaker 2 (32:38):
May we gotta put these things on blasts. It's incorrect.
Speaker 1 (32:40):
It's beautiful song. So those are all voices on that intro, right,
all those sounds, it's all a voice manipulated. And then
your voice incredible. You harmonize with yourself really well.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
I love harmonies. When a voice can become a pad
or a simp or something as well, it's exciting.
Speaker 1 (32:53):
You know. Yeah, it's a really gorgeous sound your voice,
like when it builds out like that. It's gorgeous escapism too.
I love the two different perspectives two different voices. It's
like you're in the story and then you kind of
get like you're narrating it for us, right, which is
like a cool thing to do.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
So love to bounce between first person and third person.
I find that fun and like, yeah, the narration aspect
of it. I always like it's funny. Sometimes I'll be
writing and all the other day with me and my
creative director, we're trying to do something, and I kept
I realized, I just love to mix. He's like, you know,
this sentence is third person and this sentences first person.
(33:30):
And I was like, you know what, I like mixing it.
Fuck it.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Yet? Why not? Yeah, after this last break, we'll come
back with the rest of my conversation with Ray. We're
back with the rest of my conversation with Ray. It's
not by Mary Jane a little bit. What made you
choose that as a song title?
Speaker 2 (33:52):
All the songs we wrote in Utah? You know, I
wanted to address kind of these subjects kind of pretty
head on. And I think I've always had a very
kind of addictive personality, and I've i think especially because
I was playing this like sweet little hot artists kind
of character, or at least that's what I was attempting
(34:13):
to sell. But really behind closed doors, I was just
really not dealing with things great, and I was just outside,
not even outside. I was just moving mad. Yeah, and
I got trapped into some pretty intense kind of cycles
and picked up some unhealthy habits, you know how it be.
Sometimes Also you become really good at hiding it. I
was just distant from my family. I was just lost
(34:35):
and not happy.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
Does your family kind of recognize what was going on?
Speaker 2 (34:38):
Yeah? I didn't really seen it. I think it was
like a year or whatever. I saw my parents like
twice in a year, which is really unlike me. Now
my parents are like around me all the time and
I tell them everything and I love him. But yeah,
there was just a period of time where I was
fully on escapers and vibes. Yeah, I mean, just yeah,
running away from reality. There's a lot of these subjects
(34:59):
which I find there's no real place to have these
conversations or in a space where you don't feel judged
or you don't feel disgusting or embarrassed.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
You know.
Speaker 2 (35:10):
I talk in this song about codeine, you know, and
there's a lot of us who can develop these kind
of dependencies on things, and it's so easy to keep
a secret and hide it and it can get dangerous,
and it did for me for a bit, you know.
So I just wanted to write a song, kind of weird,
twisted kind of love song. I think it's one of
those things as well. Once you open Pandora's box, you know,
(35:31):
but they say it's it's hard to close it.
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Yeah, were you ever wary of I mean, Mary Jane escapeism,
body dysmorphia? Was there ever a part of you that
we felt like maybe I don't want this on the app?
Because then of course just from the bit of press
that I've picked up about you over time, it's like, wow,
people are asking you really like heavy. I'm like, I
(35:55):
don't know if I don't want to talk about this,
Like I just just like, how how did you ever
feel worried about that? Do you not? Do you regret it?
But does every part of you feel like damn? I
don't know if I want to go? You know.
Speaker 2 (36:05):
It's like you know what I think, I think a
conscious choice you have to make as an artist, Like
what kind of artists am I going to be? There
are incredible artists who don't let you in on that
side of their life who close those doors and they
deliver perfection, And that's a whole other thing, because then
(36:26):
you're just dealing with all of those things behind closed doors,
but you present this and I have so much respect
for those kinds of artists, and that in itself takes
a whole load of bravery and rehearsals and skill and delivery.
That's a whole other thing. And then I think there's
the other end of it where it's like I'm going
(36:48):
to be an open book. But then that at the
same time, that also comes with people who you don't
know knowing things about me that four years ago my
own family didn't know. Do you know what I mean?
It's an interesting choice I've made, And definitely there are
days where it's like, damn, I really just did a lot,
and days are on stage like why did I decide
(37:11):
to be so open about this? But for all of
the times I do find it tricky or overwhelming, I
do think that's the kind of artists I want to be,
even though it's not always easy. Does that make sense? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (37:23):
I mean it kind of does make you a real
writer in a way, and that writers really want to
write about real human experience and are kind of always
drudging and mining that stuff all the time, you know,
like kind of the misery and a sense and sometimes
the joy and all that too, but kind of moving
between those two in music, you know, I think some
(37:43):
people shy away from that.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
It's difficult, but also it's what you feel comfortable, or
what your purpose is. Some artists purposes to entertain, and
damn well do they entertain, you know. And I think
for me as a writer, I kind of see it
as you're creating a commentary on the human experience from
your perspective, and that does require honesty. I think vulnerability
(38:05):
is so important and it's difficult. Sometimes it can be
very difficult for me personally in my taste. I always
find the music that I connect to the most is
where I feel just like I've been let in and
I'm just hearing candidness. It hurts. Sometimes it's like oh sugar,
or it's like not even for me just as a listener,
(38:26):
you know, you're like, oh my god, this is bringing
tears to my eyes. You know, if someone's telling your
story and you're just you have goosebumps all over your
skin and you're completely enchanted. And then it takes you
to somewhere in your life and then provide some sort
of aid or band aid we say, plaster, or some
sort of hug or some sort of space for you
to cry and feel it. So as a listener, that's
(38:48):
where I feel most moved. But it's definitely not an
easy thing to do.
Speaker 1 (38:53):
Was ice Cream Man? Was that a difficult song to
record and to Yeah, I.
Speaker 2 (38:57):
Mean, without a doubt, Yeah, definitely the whole. Yeah, that
one's deep. It's just deep, because my god, that song,
it's just I'm still you know, like a lot of
us are working through those things in it. But I
got a message the other day on my Instagram DMS.
Trying not to spend too much time on my socials
(39:18):
and stuff, but every now and then I have a
little look. And it was maybe about two days ago,
and I got this message from this lady and she
was about in her fifties and she sent me this long,
beautiful message. It was really sad message about her life,
and she was telling me about some of the things
she went through as a child and working through it,
(39:41):
and it was so moving. I was so moved. I
read it about six times. Even brings to his to
my eyes now, and I was just like, my goodness,
like some of us are carrying so much. And she
just expressed at the end of the message that she
was really grateful for that song because it gave her
the confidence to talk to someone that she loved about
(40:04):
something she'd beencerned about her whole life. There are so
many of us out here dealing with things, carrying things,
holding things. There's no instruction manual what to do. This
is where music is like medicine and provides a space
of healing or reflection. So as tricky is that song
is for me on the worst to days, I'm just
so grateful that even if it was only her, you
(40:25):
know that that's even been able to provide some sort
of I don't even know what the words are, but
I was just so mood.
Speaker 1 (40:32):
Do you perform the song?
Speaker 2 (40:33):
Yeah? I do now. Sometimes it's sad, sometimes I do
cry a lot. Sometimes I could sing it and I
feel really powerful. I feel really safe inside my music.
I think that's another thing that maybe allows me to
be so honest and vulnerable. It feels like if I
was just to say some of the lyrics in this
(40:54):
conversation with you, but without a melody and without the
safe space inside a song, I would not be comfortable
to do that at all, which is weird. But it
feels like within a song, it's on my terms in
the sonic bed. That feels like it's correct to lie
and it feels safe. It feels like no one can
(41:18):
spin this or nobody can have an opinion too negative
besides not liking the song, but they can't be like,
well I don't believe her, Well this and that, you know,
all the scrutiny that you can get from being open
and transparent about your life. But without a song, Yeah, you.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
Have a new single Genesis, and it's really great. But
when it started, I was like, okay, all right, like
we and then you know, three quarters of the way
through or halfway through, there's a change, and it's like
the most uplifting. The first half is a little it's
a little like, oh shoot, like this is like I
feel like I was a little worried as I guess
(41:57):
she's still in like a and by the end I'm like,
oh shit, it feels like I'm in preservation Hall and
new and it's like the lyric is what's the lyric about?
Light Like blood and lighting.
Speaker 2 (42:09):
They'd be l like, yeah, they'd be light.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
It feels maybe more like where your life is now
than some of the album, you know, I know that
feels true to you.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
Yeah. I think the Planners will put out the full
seven minutes and then the week after kind of split
them into three different songs. So you have Genesis one,
which is that kind of really sad reflection in the
mirror of depressing conversation with yourself someone. Song two is
that heavy whatever sound, and then song three is the
(42:39):
kind of big band vibe at the end, and I
think you can almost see it as maybe an EP
or something. But I wanted to put all the songs
in one and kind of force you to try and
have to listen to all of it just in one,
which is a lot and I think I really took
like a lot of passion and a lot of time
went into the lyrics for me and making sure that
(43:00):
it said what it needed to say. I wanted it
to be cutting and again honest, and I wanted to
talk about themes of you know, suicide and which is
again just I think also even for young men, I
think there's this kind of thing of like just feeling
things and not talking about it. I recently lost someone
(43:23):
who was really close to the family, just gone, you know,
and you didn't even know that they were going for anything.
Speaker 1 (43:29):
Suicide.
Speaker 2 (43:30):
Yeah, there's a lot of people just as you know,
fighting a lot of stuff. I wanted to create a
song that felt like if you are going for anything
like that, or you do feel in any sort of
way burdened or like you're going for a really tough time.
I wanted to create a piece of music that you
could allow yourself to feel it in the beginning, and
(43:52):
then the music kind of starts to lift you up
in the middle, even though the lyric is still heavy,
taking you maybe to a more powerful place to process
that emotion, and then by the end hopefully feeling some
positivity and some hope. So I wanted it to be
this journey of if any one even relates to one
of the sentences in that song, you know, And I
(44:12):
was trying to create an open scape of my honesty.
But then also what else are people our love or
people I don't even know going through or need from
this song? So it's quite a deep one, Yeah it is.
Speaker 1 (44:24):
Well, I'm so grateful you loved us with that we needed,
so we absolutely needed. Yeah, man, how are you going
to do that live? Well?
Speaker 2 (44:38):
Look, in my dream scenario, there will always be many
many musicians on the stage. From a cost efficiency perspective,
we're working now, but you know who needs to make
notes of money? Like who needs to do that?
Speaker 1 (44:52):
Sure? I mean travel with the big band? Bring them out?
You worked with Dark Child? I love Dark Child? Rodney Man,
how did you look about Rodney?
Speaker 2 (45:02):
That's my bro. I actually met him when I was
a kid, like my first trip to LA when I
was about seventeen, and I was taking some meetings and
I remember at the time I hadn't made anything good
enough to like really capture his attention. But I remember
thinking in my head like one day he's going to
hear my music and be like she's sick. Like I
remember that being a goal. And then we got connected
(45:23):
and maybe like two years ago, and got in the
studio and started working on what is this song? So
it's been a labor of love for quite a long time.
He's really brilliant and I have a lot of love
for him, and I put him through the ring.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
On this Tell me about it.
Speaker 2 (45:38):
Oh my god. I called him again and be like,
we need to fix the drums. I'm like, we need to.
You know, we had this original drum loop and I'm like,
it's giving, but it wasn't live. It had a live texture,
but some of the frequencies were too sharp and it
was jarring. And I was like, we need to it
needs to have the same feel, but it needs to
feel clean and a bit more raw and down to
(45:59):
earth and and not have that kind of distracting whatever.
And he'd be like, okay, okay. So we trapped different
things and then we go back and back and and
then it was like, finally, yes, we got it. So
we took the original drummer and made it like twenty
percent in volume and then played this new one over
the top so you still get that whatever. And then
I remember I was at the baseline. I think we
need a completely different melody to it. So then we
(46:21):
did this baseline where I basically recorded twenty and we
stacked and stacked and stacked, vocally manipulated it, put it
down the octave, and then played a symp with it.
Like there was so much experimentation and things that needed
to be changed, things that needed to be added, and
(46:42):
he was so patient with me because I'm so annoying
every little detail life Ronnie, we needed her, I'll call
him like Hi, Ray, Like hey, So, I was just
thinking that we need a new verse two, you know,
and maybe we do a string section. I even have
notes now, and we've handed in the master, and I'm
(47:04):
thinking maybe the vinyl is going to be different to
the version that's going to come out. I think we
need a more soft detexture on verse one because the
lyrics already so hard that you need some softness around it,
you know. And then we played these brass on SNL
that was so good that I'm like, we need to
add that in. So there's probably going to be some
changes in the vinyl of seven inch version that we
(47:27):
printed to what you're hearing now. Rodney's such a jeep,
like he's a legend. He's one of the best in
the game. He's just constantly leveling up, creating music that
just stands and tests the time wherever or some.
Speaker 1 (47:38):
Of the best singers Janet Tony Braxton, I mean, come on,
I mean just the greatest singers work As an album artist,
do you have a sense of what you want to
do next? I like to make an album, okay, but
doing it out like you do, you have a goal
that I want it to be by boom or you just.
Speaker 2 (47:58):
Like it just has to be good by my own standard,
and I think I'll need to live a little bit
to like make a really good album. Otherwise I'm just
gonna be writing about hotel rooms and winding roads and
nobody wants to hear that. So I need to go
and collect some stories as well and live a little bit.
(48:20):
I'm aware that it's a bit scary in the times
we're in with everyone having such short attention spans, and
you know, we're it's such an amazing place right now
that everyone's like, oh, well, when's the next shit coming on?
Like fucking hell damn, Like, I need to go. I
need to write. I'm not going to put anything out
that I don't love and I don't believe it's good,
(48:42):
and it's got to at least be a little bit
better than, in my opinion, the album we just put
out of what's the point, I mean, got be leveling up.
Speaker 1 (48:49):
Hey, well, I can't wait to hear it. I hope, Yeah,
me too, I can't wait to hear it. I'm sure
it'll be great. It's a great great talking to you
no like guys. Thank you. Thanks to Ray for speaking
so openly about her life, inspiration and her music. Her
new single, Genesis is out now everywhere. You can hear
(49:10):
a playlist of all of our favorite race songs at
broken record podcast dot com. Subscribe to our YouTube channel
at YouTube dot com slash broken Record Podcast, where you
can find all of our new episodes. You can follow
us on Twitter at broken Record. Broken Record is produced
and edited by Leah Rose, with marketing help from Eric
Sandler and Jordan McMillan. Our engineer is Ben Tolliday. Broken
(49:34):
Record is a production of Pushkin Industries. If you love
this show and others from Pushkin, consider subscribing to Pushkin Plus.
Pushkin Plus is a podcast subscription that offers bonus content
and ad free listening for four ninety nine a month.
Look for Pushkin Plus on Apple Podcasts subscriptions. And if
you like this show, please remember to share, rate, and
(49:55):
review us on your podcast app. Our theme music's by
Kenny Beats. I'm justin Richmond.
Pushkin Raised, an English pop singer songwriter whose debut album
My twenty first Century Blues snagged Album of the Year
at this year's BRIT Awards, but that was just one
of six total awards she took home that evening. For Ray,
who at twenty six, has already survived in tumultuous rides
(00:36):
through the music industry, the evening was a complete coup.
Ray started writing songs as a young girl growing up
in South London. By seventeen, she signed her first record
deal with Polydor Records and worked for the next seven
years as a songwriter. While writing songs for artists like Beyonce,
John Legend and Rihanna, Ray was also writing her own songs,
(00:56):
which her label refused to release. She was eventually able
to leave Polydor and in twenty twenty three independently released
her debut album to heaps of critical acclaim, kicked off
by her viral TikTok powered hit Escapism. Ray's vulnerability on
her album about her own struggles with self esteem, substance abuse,
and sexual assaults have proven to resonate deeply with fans everywhere.
(01:20):
On today's episode, I talked to Ray about her wild
journey through the music business. She explains how a quote
from Nina Simone gave her the courage to take control
of her career, how a ski trip in Utah helped
inspire some of her best songwriting ever, and about her
sprawling new single out Everywhere now called Genesis. This is
(01:41):
broken record liner notes for the digital Age. I'm justin Ritchman.
Here's my conversation with ray Man. Your Coachella set seemed
like it was really well received. I got to see
a bit of it. It was awesome.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
It was definitely really a special one for us. I
think it's the first time I've witnessed a crowd like
that for me in a festival in the States, you know,
So that was like a really special change. But it's
something I'm not used to out here.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
What felt different about that crowd?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Well, I think in America, like it's it's always been intimidating.
I think as a British artist, you know, the idea
of like performing in America anyways, just intimidating. And you know,
I've done quite a few, not loads, but a few
other festivals out here where you're like, right, we need
to win the crowd, we need to grow the crowd. Yeah,
(02:35):
so Coachella just I wasn't expecting it to be that full,
and people were really engaged and it was really special.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
This wasn't a case of you getting your music out
to a bunch of people at the festival. It's like
those were people are like now converted, like people are
Ray fans.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
Do you know what? I do have a habit during
during shows of really over analyzing everyone's faces. I feel
like at the beginning of the set, I was like, right,
I need I was like, right, I need to win.
I need people to get to know me, you know
kind of thing. And I always try and leave a
bit of space. We ended up taking a song or
two out so that I'd have more time to chat.
(03:12):
I like to have a little chat some people. She
needs to stop talking about. I'd just like to talk.
And I think also it's a case of maybe some
people have heard the songs or maybe the song that
started to cross over here, and they're like, let's go
and see what it's about. And I think my mission
is always during a performance, I just want people to
walk away and be like I would see that again,
(03:33):
or that was good. You know, That's my goal. Yeah,
and you can see people being one of you know,
people going from stern faith or just like watching with
no expression to being like okay, or do you know
what I mean, You're like way even they're doing it
and you're like okay, cool, Like you know, have.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
You discovered little things that you can do over the
course of a set to maybe like reliably win people over.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
I think honesty has always been something that's kind of important.
I've never really I don't really plan what I say.
I kind of keep the music. You know, we know
what we're doing within the songs, but even some of
the endings of songs we leave space, and I just
kind of like it to be as open as possible.
And I think sometimes when you're just playing songs and
(04:17):
not talking, people can't really get to know you. They're
just getting to know the music. So I think that's
an important thing as well. I like to try and
give a little back story behind whatever this song is
about or this moment, and just.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Being not a script your stage banter at all.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
No, So sometimes I'd be like, oh my god, why.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Did I just say that you halfway through targets, Like
what am I saying? Yeah? No, there is a lot
of that when am I going with that?
Speaker 2 (04:42):
I think I even did that. I was like, I
don't know why, I just told you that, let's move on,
you know.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Yeah, that's amazing. Yeah, the way the album came about
was kind of security's It wasn't a situation where you
were at a label. It basically there was a lot
of roadblocks if you want to just I guess walk
us through some of those.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Yeah, it's just not necessarily been as simple ten years
to get to this moment. You know. I was about
seventeen when I signed my deal, and I was with
a record label for seven years, and I think, yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
Can we name them? No? I mean, I mean, I
think it's on the record.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
And you know, I think being a British artist, it's
a very different world out there. I think it's very
dance orientated. There are formulas typically that are safer formulas
that you practice as a songwriter. You know, I started
in this game as a songwriter from the age of
fourteen is when I really took it seriously, and I
(05:47):
was doing sessions off school and stuff, and you kind
of learn really quickly. Okay, there's a formula to this,
you know, accessibility, repetition, symmetry, you know, the whole math spine,
the kind of the songwriting thing, and.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
How did that change your songwriting as a young Like
when you're fourteen, I imagine you're coming to it pretty pure,
like just probably just want to do express and eight yeah,
and then you're realizing there's like a formula. Did that
change your songwriting.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Opposed to like change? I think it's just almost a
world of just gathering skills. You know, when I started
writing songs, it was very much feeling and freestyling and
what felt right and being like, oh, I did a
lot of songwriting in Sweden. There's some incredible pop rous
songwriters out there, and I used to fly out for
a couple of weeks at a time and write with
all the producers and writers to anyone that would let
(06:34):
me in a session. And from that you're like, oh wow,
you know, it's not just whatever melody feels nice. It's like, okay,
we have a melody here. The end of the melody
is a little bit too complicated. This word doesn't roll
off the tongue as nice, you know, and chipping away
and sculpting something, so yeah, you know, they're all skills
that I'm really glad I acquired. And I think for
(06:57):
different artists and different sounds and different genres, you kind
of need more of one skill than another and stuff
like that. But within that space, you know, dance music
is huge at symmetry and maths and repetition and lyric
that everyone can relate to and easily digestible and stuff
like that. So I kind of, from a younger age
realized I had a knack at being persistent and chipping
(07:18):
away at something until the artist or the person I
was writing with was happy and.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
You could take whatever criticism that would come with a
version one.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
And when writing for someone else, it's not about you know,
my opinion to a degree, But you know, I'm a
people pleaser as well, So I'm going to make this song,
going to do it so they love it. You know,
it's all a performance as well. In another way, it's
kind of funny. But yeah, I think when that started
to cross over and bleed into what my label at
the time wanted from me, and the goal was selling
(07:50):
opposed to the art itself, did.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
You know that going in or was that kind of
a were you blindsided a bit by Oh?
Speaker 2 (07:57):
No, of course not. Yeah, nobody does. Yeah, it's a
real thing. You know that moment before you put pen
on paper. Everyone is so nice. They take you for dinners,
sell you a whole lot of lovely dreams and promises.
Like some of the things. I was like sixteen years
old when I started doing the rounds and some of
(08:19):
the things I heard, Oh my god, I'm not even
gonna run me on here, because but it's wild.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
What are you wear?
Speaker 2 (08:26):
Something like? You know this? We have this artist said artists.
I won't even name the name, but they've heard your music.
They've agreed to endorse you. If you sign with Vice,
you're going to have this. You're going to have that.
This isn't even this is just people just talk and
artists in this stage. No people will say anything to
(08:46):
get you to put your name on that piece of paper.
When you're sixteen years old from South London and you're
like in America doing meetings with these big, huge people,
it can absolutely just muddel your brain up and false
hope and a lot of lies, a lot of air
that's real. I was like, raw, this place is dark.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
How quickly after you put fended papers you realize that,
oh I just got bamboos.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Maybe I'd like to say a year in maybe Also
the guy who had signed me had then left, so
the dynamics changed pretty quickly after that.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
That's a pretty common story too, I think, I hear, yeah,
it is your support structure leaves and then you're kind
of left.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
There's actually a contractual clause called a key Man clause,
which artists should know about, and I didn't at the time,
but it means, you know, you get that clause put
into your contract, means if the person who signs you leaves,
that you have the right to terminate or move with them.
It's called a key Man clause, and it's just something
I wish I knew about when I was seventeen.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
To what extent were you happy with the early phases
and stages of your career like those first from like
sixteen seventeen to you know, a couple of years ago,
only a few years ago.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
Well, I think it was a tricky one because it
wasn't about my goals. It was about, you know, needing
to impress these people who basically have my career in
their hands. You know, they get to decide whether they're
going to promote something or they're not, whether they're going
(10:30):
to pause my timeline or help me move things along.
So you have to play ball, you know, and you
learn that pretty quick. Yeah, So I did my best
to do that. The goal always has been since the
day that I signed to now in my career, to
be an album's artist. I wanted to release bodies of work,
(10:51):
and I was really excited to be able to earn
the right to decide what music I wanted to share.
And it was kind of always presented that. You know,
when you have a song that's big enough and you've
earned an audience that's big enough and wants an album
from you, that you can do that.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
So, yeah, when did your debut album start coming together?
When did you record that?
Speaker 2 (11:14):
I would say maybe about four or five years ago.
Some of the earliest songs started coming together.
Speaker 1 (11:22):
What were the first few?
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Oscar Win in Tears was there for a long time
hard out Here, but the instrumental was made years ago.
But then I wrote a whole nother song on top
of it Worth It was an older one, yeah, A
couple of songs had just been around for a while.
Five Stars was an old one, yeah, and I had
the title about four years ago. It's funny because I
(11:45):
was going through some of my notebooks at home and
I found this notebook. It was dated like twenty eighteen
or something. It said my twenty first century Blues.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
So the title the ideas were forming for a while.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
Yeah. Do you remember why that title came to you?
Why that phrase came to you?
Speaker 2 (12:04):
I don't know completely. What I do know is when
I was a kid, maybe it was about four ten
years old, and my dad and my uncle we went
on a road trip. Basically, we drove through America. We
started in la and we went all the way through
to I think it was Atlanta. We ended somewhere and
we drove all through Nashville, We drove through New Orleans
(12:24):
and Louisiana. We like did our whole trip. And at
that time, everywhere we'd drive, we'd put on the local radios,
you know in the UK. You know, I've listened to
a lot of gospel and some of the greats, amazing singers,
but there was so much music and genres I've never
been exposed to. And I think I had a life
changing experience when I was in New Orleans, and it
was at a place called the Preservation Jazz Hall and
(12:48):
it was like a room, like one hundred and fifty
people coming to this room and there's just this band.
And I remember being sat cross legged on the floor.
I was sat right underneath this guy's trombone. I had
like spit flying in my face. She sat there like
wide eyed, just like.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
What is this.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
I'd never experienced anything like it. And it was just
a fusion of kind of jazz and the blues. And
I remember being like, whatever this is, I want a
part of that. And since then, I kind of my
tastes changed and I just wanted to know more and
understand more about this feeling, this kind of music. And yeah,
so although we barely scratch over any kind of blues
(13:28):
textures in this album, what I fell in love with
was the songwriting and how you know, we go to
these bars and you've got people playing.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
Be like.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
When I was a little boy, I went to school
one day and then I sat on a chair, no
just say you know what I mean? These stories and
each one was different. It was the same riff and
just all these stories and I was like, wow, so
this is their blues. And I was like, this is
(14:04):
deep and they're deep stories, moving stories, very honest and
transparent and clearful, and I fell in love. I'd always
had this idea if I wanted to make whatever my
version of the blues is, even though it's not necessarily
that genre, it's that candidness.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Well, and there's a bravado on a lot of your
you know. I don't know if it's like the whole album,
because there's some very vulnerable bits, but there is an
added to a backbone to this album for sure that
runs through it. And I love the book ends. It's like,
as you put it on, it's like you're being transported
to like a smokey jazz club, you know what I mean.
(14:41):
And and by the time it ends, you're right back there,
and then you're almost ready to play right over again.
And it's amazing to hear that that stuck with you,
and then that made it that far from child a
childhood road trip across the ten through from LA to
New Orleans and up that that stayed with you all
these years. It really did. After a quick break, we'll
be back with more of my conversation with Ray. We're
(15:06):
back with more from Ray, who referenced wanting to be
in an album artist. What were some of the albums
that you grew up on that were like the bed
rocks for you, like the ones that were like the
perfect records for you.
Speaker 2 (15:18):
My goodness. The first two albums that played such an
important part in my childhood was Alicia Keys The Diary
of Alisha Keys. That was a big one for me. Wow,
that was the first hard copy album I ever bought.
And then Who Is Jill Scott? Jill Scott? That blew
my mind? And I think also like being in the
(15:40):
UK and just again the stuff we was exposed to.
And then my uncle shout out. Uncle jose put me
on to this album. He started with a Long Walk
and I was listening to this song like she's just
talking with melodies. You know, you're used to hearing these
perfect rhyming couplets and everything being whatever, but she's just
(16:01):
like speaking to you like a conversation, and it was
so casual the way she would sing that entire album
blew my mind. Watching me, you know, she's like she's
talking about CCTV and people watching her like she's just
gone to the shop to buy some double or triple
A batteries. She's like checking and see where I go?
(16:22):
Who I be? How where with who I make my money?
Speaker 1 (16:26):
What is this?
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Excuse me? Miss may, I have your telephone number and
your social security She's like, who me? It's like literally
telling I was like, what is happening? It completely blew
my mind and I fell in love. So those were
like two really important albums in my childhood.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Yeah, I wanted to ask you about your relationship with
hip hop because it feels like there's a certain cadence
that you can get into sometimes that that would also
explain it a lot too, Like that kind of being
able to where it's like are you talking? Are you singing?
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Kind of doing both Jills Queen of that isn't it?
Speaker 1 (16:58):
And then sometimes you just like she'll be doing that
and then just take off to whoa Okay, I forgot
who was right?
Speaker 2 (17:05):
And it's also so free, you know with her. I
love her style of you feel like anything could happen,
do you know what I mean? It doesn't feel too perfect.
It just feels so authentic. And I've always loved her
about her the way she sings and performs as well. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Were you listening to a lot of hip hop too
growing up?
Speaker 2 (17:24):
Yeah? A fair amount. I mean I did get to
that age where like Party next Door was my everything
that's not really hip hop, but you know Drake the
Weekends Party next Door, you know that era we all
had where we're.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
All like, oh my god, going up on a Tuesday.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
Yeah, the Other Weekend's first album was was a big one,
the trilogy. Yeah, But in terms of like hip hop,
I don't know what kind of exposed to some different stuff.
I was exposed to a lot grown up and like
different family members as well.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Did you see Uncle Jose.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Yeah, he's actually lives in America. So my mum and
my uncle were both raised in Ghana. When they're about
twenty two to twenty three, mum moved to the UK
and Uncle Jose moved to America. And he's always been
so supportive as well, Like he bought me my first laptop,
(18:15):
my MacBook where I used to start making sessions on
garage band and stuff like that when I was about
thirteen for my thirteenth birthday, and so I started making
a lot of demos on there and it really helped
spark my passion for production and vocal production and just
making music in general. It's so funny because even though
none of us before me and my sisters had ever
(18:36):
practiced music. It was always the desire for it and
the passion for it was always in the blood. I'd say,
like my dad's dad, he used to write songs. He
used to want to be a songwriter professionally in a
little town in England, north of England, Yorkshire. He used
to write songs on record them onto tape and score
it out and write the lyrics, and he'd send a
(18:59):
box of tapes and the sheet music to record labels
in London, hoping that you know, someone might hear his
songs and like it. And I can't even be too
can But he did have a song stolen from him
that turned out to be really successful. But you know,
theres a lot of songwriters it happened for back in
the day. He didn't get credited and no one believed him,
(19:19):
and he had no way legally to prove it because
he didn't have the money to do that, and then
he gave up on his dream then and there. It's
so funny that I was a kid and I didn't
even know the story, and I'm like, I just want
to write music. So it's funny at that time, No,
I was like seven eight nine when I was like
making silly, weird poems and copying the melodies i'd hear
(19:44):
in the TV kids shows I was watching. And I
remember one time I was watching this like TV show
and I liked the melody. It was like this kind
of jazzy and I was about eight, and I pretended
that I wrote it, but I just changed all the words.
And then I went to dad, my dad, and I
was like, listen to this song I wrote, and he
(20:06):
was blown away, but I didn't tell him I'd stolen
the song and just change the lyrics to some terrible
lyrics about snowfalling and a Christmas song. It was so bad.
I like, how that still sticks with you somewhere, like
I'm afraid of plagiarism. But then I realized that's what songwriters.
Some songwriters do that, or it's sampling essentially.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
Yeah, way to get started, you know, like copy a
bit and the lyrics so you can figure out how
to do a whole class. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
But yeah, it's always been in the my family. We
love music. You know. I grew up in church as well.
My dad and mom used to sing. Mom used to
sing in the choir. Dad used to leave worship so
I grew up watching and listening to music being sung
every Sunday.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
In like in a church where you grew up, what
was leading worship? Like would that entails?
Speaker 2 (20:53):
It was like, I don't know, like it's not a
big church that maybe forty or fifty people, you know
in a church in Tooting in South London where I
grew up, and my mom and dad would.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Just sing so like a gospel choir.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
No, it's not big, like you know in America, you
guys have an amazing like huge production set ups, like
amazing music. You know, this is very like down to
earth from the heart, very.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Direct from you guys to God in the gospel.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
You know, come as you are mate.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
You know, did you listen to much gospel?
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Yeah, definitely, Yeah, growing up with a lot of Kurt
Franklin and Donnie McClerkin and some amazing music I was
exposed to from a really young age. And I think
about gospel as well, is it's just musically so complex.
I don't even think gospel gets enough credit for how
technically difficult it is to really execute those things. You know,
you have them mds live in the church on a
(21:58):
microphone like okay, we're going to chord four and then five. Hold, hold, hold,
we're going six to seven, don't. I'm like, this is
serious practice.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Oh for real, it's not joke. No, it's great. I
want to go back now. So you have a few
songs for my twenty fifth Century Blues. You're still with Polydor.
You're kind of getting the run around what happens next.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
The understanding from my perspective also was if I was
going to do an album, it would need to be
a dance album. So my twenty first Century Blues kind
of got put on the back burner and I was
working on a record I needed to hand in songs
one p fifteen bpm or above, like it needed to
be like that kind of sound. So, as far as
(22:44):
my constraints allowed, I set out to make an album
that I was going to call dark dance Songs, and
it was going to be minor. And I'd say the
closest thing I had to it was that black mascara
which I put on my twenty fifth Century Blues. It
was all this kind of I was trying to find
my compromise, and then yeah, it just ended up that,
you know, I had a new person who just joined
(23:05):
our team and started working as my day to day
and she was supposed to tell me we were in
the middle of a shoot for something else. You know,
I'm like maybe four or five months into writing this album,
and I'm becoming invested and I'm excited about what it's
going to be. And then she'd basically just said that
if this song you've just put out doesn't do good,
You're not going to be able to do the album.
It just got really messy, and I was just I
(23:28):
hit just a boiling point, a breaking point. I was
so angry and so frustrated and so pissed off. I
felt like just I was just getting treated so unfairly,
and I've been trying so desperately for the last seven
years to prove to them that I am a musician, Like, look,
I'm writing for this person, Like are you proud of
(23:49):
me yet?
Speaker 1 (23:49):
Like I was just so desperate who are you're writing for?
Speaker 2 (23:51):
At that time, you know, I had a good healthy
amount of cuts, you know, in the dance world and
with some girl bands and some solo artists, and I'd
been doing good things and every time I remember, every
time I get caught, I'd kind of want to tell
them and be like, look, look, I was just so
desperate for them to believe in me. Really, I've really
(24:16):
tried so hard to achieve that and I just failed.
So yeah, it just got to a breaking point.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Yeah so I know you sent a tweet out at
some point? Was that a spur of the moment thing?
Was that calculated like let me just try something here?
Speaker 2 (24:31):
Or what was the zero strategy and planning into that?
Not tell you? I just was like in my head,
what the F do I have to lose? Like I
have nothing to lose. I was at a point where
I was like, I would rather just be a songwriter,
like I've seven years is a long time, especially from
(24:51):
a kid, you know, and then that pressure of that,
I think it's a lie personally, but that pressure of
you know, when you're young, it's exciting and as you
grow up you're going to miss your window, especially as
a woman, like these lies you hear and Yeah, just
got to a place where if this is what it
is to be an artist, I don't want to do this.
I hate some of these songs I'm putting my name
to that. I'm out here smiling and returning her like
(25:11):
trying to sell this is like soul destroying, especially when
I'm like in love with my craft. I'm in love
with music. I was a kid when I decided to
dedicate my life to work in music and wanting to
pursue a career, and it was breaking my heart. It
was just making me so sad. Yeah, So I just
(25:34):
got to a point. We just moved house and I
was in my room. It didn't have a bed in it,
so I just remember being like on a block mattress
on the floor, and the only thing I had in
my room was a picture of Nina Simone and under
it it said a quote it's an artist's duty to
reflect the times. And I remember sat there in tears, like,
what the hell am I doing. I'm not doing anything important,
(25:56):
I'm not doing anything that feels right. Nina would be
so disgusted by everything I put to my name. She
would be like, ill get her out of my face.
I was like, what have I become like? And I
said no, no, no, and I just let it rip.
Speaker 1 (26:17):
That's a very needless, a long thing to do. Let
it rip. I mean, thankfully it all worked out. I suppose,
as the story goes from that tweet, do you guys
work something out so they let you go. Does that
go back to that clause the key man.
Speaker 2 (26:28):
No, I sadly never had that clause in my contract.
I think I just got so lucky in that people
decided to care about what I'd shared. And I think
probably there's also a lot of people unaware of all
the ins and outs of what goes on behind closed doors.
And I had a lot of news platforms in the
UK reaching out, wanting to have a conversation and wanting
(26:50):
to understand more about what's going on and what it
can be like for a lot of artists sometimes when
you're having difficulties on seeing eye to eye with the
teams that you're contractually bound to, and that became leverage
and I was able to be like, respectfully, let's leave
(27:13):
this here now and.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
Then you get to put out your album independently. Yeah.
I don't know that it could have worked out more
perfectly in the end.
Speaker 2 (27:21):
No, it's honestly how everything's turned out, is all I
can describe it as is a series of just miracle
after miracle. I think I was so overwhelmed at how
much music of mine was already out there in the world.
In my head, I was like, how could I possibly
change the narrative? In the UK, people see me as
a feature vocalist, a voice like, who's going to care?
Speaker 1 (27:45):
You know?
Speaker 2 (27:46):
I just got so ridiculously lucky and Escapism receiving so
much attention on TikTok and then all of its suddenly
getting pushed out to all these new ears and that's
the first they've heard of me, and that's so it
was so exciting and like, wow, you know, anything really
(28:06):
is possible.
Speaker 1 (28:07):
Were you shocked by the reception of Escapism?
Speaker 2 (28:10):
Oh? Completely, yeah. But I was also so happy because
I love that song. I remember when we put that out.
Oh my gosh, Like, if only people were going to
be able to hear this song that was my thing
in my head. I was like, oh, just if people
could just hear this song, you know. I remember me
and my dad was talking. I was like, Dad, could
(28:30):
you imagine, Yeah, if something crazy happened and Escapism just
went really big and became number one, we looked at
each other and we were like, ah, ha ha, that'll
never happened. I remember that conversation clear as day. I
was like, could you imagine? He was like, yeah, I
could imagine. That would be crazy right, and then bang.
Speaker 1 (28:52):
Fruish. Why did you write that song in Utah?
Speaker 2 (28:56):
Yeah? I did.
Speaker 1 (28:57):
What's the story on that?
Speaker 2 (28:58):
We took a road trip another road trip.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
I like, good for you.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
I like a car. I like a long drive. And
also it's good to get out of the city. I
think when you're in a city and you know, be
there or whatever, it can be distracting and you could
be like someone like do you want to do this?
La la la, and you just want to go somewhere
in the middle of nowhere where you're just in a
peaceful place and you just have to be present. It
was nice never No. All the two people I went
(29:26):
with are good at skiing. I'm not very good at
save only skied once before in the school trip. I
decided to join them for skiing in between writing, and
it was a disaster. These two are like cross country,
like off Pieced Mountain, freaking skiers. Yeah, they're like, don't worry,
we'll stay together, We'll go slow. I took a wrong
(29:46):
turn in black Run. What the only way is down?
Speaker 1 (29:50):
This?
Speaker 2 (29:50):
Whatever? Foot drop? Absolutely not?
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Whatuld you do?
Speaker 2 (29:53):
And my friend's screaming at me, like you have to
ski down? I was like bitch, I skiing down, I'm walking.
She's like free sure, And there's all these like four
year old kids like just gunning it down the hill.
Took me about an hour to get down. It was hell.
After that, I left them to it. I went sat
on the campfire near the entrance and just made friends.
(30:15):
But yeah, skiing, it's gonna be a while before I
go back there.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
Maybe take some time on there. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
But the songwriting was productive. We were there for seven
days and it was such a nice time and we
wrote basically the other half of the album that was missing.
It all started with titles. Titles are usually how a
song will start for me, So I had title Mary Jane,
environment and anxiety. Escape is body dysmorphia. So those were
(30:42):
my four titles. There was one or two more that
we wrote, but that didn't make.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
It Environmental Anxiety. Speaking of the Nina Simone quote in
artists duty is to reflect the times your I mean
is so intense. How did you capture that so well?
Speaker 2 (30:58):
We booked a log cabin and we were staring it
across it was like a mountain in some trees and
we were like, wow, that so beautiful. Was in the
morning and Mike Sabbath, the producer who I made this
album with. The guy is so eccentric. We got downstairs
and he'd made this little like oh no, no, it's
like weird like sound. He'd like morphed his voice to
(31:18):
sound like a chipmunk l whatever, and it's just looping
around and around and just playing these weird bells. And
I was like, Mike, you've lost your absolute mind, but like,
let's fucking go, do you know what I mean? And
we were looking at the view and we was like, damn,
like we're being so cruel to our planet. And we
just started on a tangent, you know. And I think
it's something a lot of us are worried about but
are powerless to really do any actual change, or it's
(31:40):
something that needs to come from our governments. Yeah, a
lot of people don't care.
Speaker 1 (31:45):
You kind of sum it all up and put a
bow on it in like three minutes and ten seconds.
It's like, yoh wow, like you kind of like distill
all the anxieties of kind of our world at large
and all the problems and issues and and Boris johnson'sn't cooking.
Speaker 2 (32:04):
We all know that's true, but come on, it seems
seems like it's true this article, yeah, which is so funny.
But they tested the sewage. I don't know who was
testing the sewage of the houzards of Parliament and they
found such a high concentration of cocaine in the sewage.
I don't even know if we should be talking about this.
(32:24):
But meanwhile, you're arresting kids with possession of smoking a
little bit of weed on the street, I mean, putting
them in jail for that. Meanwhile, you're all in there
doing coke. It's just not fair. None of it's fair,
is it.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
But I'm glad you're speaking to someone like you.
Speaker 2 (32:38):
May we gotta put these things on blasts. It's incorrect.
Speaker 1 (32:40):
It's beautiful song. So those are all voices on that intro, right,
all those sounds, it's all a voice manipulated. And then
your voice incredible. You harmonize with yourself really well.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
I love harmonies. When a voice can become a pad
or a simp or something as well, it's exciting.
Speaker 1 (32:53):
You know. Yeah, it's a really gorgeous sound your voice,
like when it builds out like that. It's gorgeous escapism too.
I love the two different perspectives two different voices. It's
like you're in the story and then you kind of
get like you're narrating it for us, right, which is
like a cool thing to do.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
So love to bounce between first person and third person.
I find that fun and like, yeah, the narration aspect
of it. I always like it's funny. Sometimes I'll be
writing and all the other day with me and my
creative director, we're trying to do something, and I kept
I realized, I just love to mix. He's like, you know,
this sentence is third person and this sentences first person.
(33:30):
And I was like, you know what, I like mixing it.
Fuck it.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Yet? Why not? Yeah, after this last break, we'll come
back with the rest of my conversation with Ray. We're
back with the rest of my conversation with Ray. It's
not by Mary Jane a little bit. What made you
choose that as a song title?
Speaker 2 (33:52):
All the songs we wrote in Utah? You know, I
wanted to address kind of these subjects kind of pretty
head on. And I think I've always had a very
kind of addictive personality, and I've i think especially because
I was playing this like sweet little hot artists kind
of character, or at least that's what I was attempting
(34:13):
to sell. But really behind closed doors, I was just
really not dealing with things great, and I was just outside,
not even outside. I was just moving mad. Yeah, and
I got trapped into some pretty intense kind of cycles
and picked up some unhealthy habits, you know how it be.
Sometimes Also you become really good at hiding it. I
was just distant from my family. I was just lost
(34:35):
and not happy.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
Does your family kind of recognize what was going on?
Speaker 2 (34:38):
Yeah? I didn't really seen it. I think it was
like a year or whatever. I saw my parents like
twice in a year, which is really unlike me. Now
my parents are like around me all the time and
I tell them everything and I love him. But yeah,
there was just a period of time where I was
fully on escapers and vibes. Yeah, I mean, just yeah,
running away from reality. There's a lot of these subjects
(34:59):
which I find there's no real place to have these
conversations or in a space where you don't feel judged
or you don't feel disgusting or embarrassed.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
You know.
Speaker 2 (35:10):
I talk in this song about codeine, you know, and
there's a lot of us who can develop these kind
of dependencies on things, and it's so easy to keep
a secret and hide it and it can get dangerous,
and it did for me for a bit, you know.
So I just wanted to write a song, kind of weird,
twisted kind of love song. I think it's one of
those things as well. Once you open Pandora's box, you know,
(35:31):
but they say it's it's hard to close it.
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Yeah, were you ever wary of I mean, Mary Jane escapeism,
body dysmorphia? Was there ever a part of you that
we felt like maybe I don't want this on the app?
Because then of course just from the bit of press
that I've picked up about you over time, it's like, wow,
people are asking you really like heavy. I'm like, I
(35:55):
don't know if I don't want to talk about this,
Like I just just like, how how did you ever
feel worried about that? Do you not? Do you regret it?
But does every part of you feel like damn? I
don't know if I want to go? You know.
Speaker 2 (36:05):
It's like you know what I think, I think a
conscious choice you have to make as an artist, Like
what kind of artists am I going to be? There
are incredible artists who don't let you in on that
side of their life who close those doors and they
deliver perfection, And that's a whole other thing, because then
(36:26):
you're just dealing with all of those things behind closed doors,
but you present this and I have so much respect
for those kinds of artists, and that in itself takes
a whole load of bravery and rehearsals and skill and delivery.
That's a whole other thing. And then I think there's
the other end of it where it's like I'm going
(36:48):
to be an open book. But then that at the
same time, that also comes with people who you don't
know knowing things about me that four years ago my
own family didn't know. Do you know what I mean?
It's an interesting choice I've made, And definitely there are
days where it's like, damn, I really just did a lot,
and days are on stage like why did I decide
(37:11):
to be so open about this? But for all of
the times I do find it tricky or overwhelming, I
do think that's the kind of artists I want to be,
even though it's not always easy. Does that make sense? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (37:23):
I mean it kind of does make you a real
writer in a way, and that writers really want to
write about real human experience and are kind of always
drudging and mining that stuff all the time, you know,
like kind of the misery and a sense and sometimes
the joy and all that too, but kind of moving
between those two in music, you know, I think some
(37:43):
people shy away from that.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
It's difficult, but also it's what you feel comfortable, or
what your purpose is. Some artists purposes to entertain, and
damn well do they entertain, you know. And I think
for me as a writer, I kind of see it
as you're creating a commentary on the human experience from
your perspective, and that does require honesty. I think vulnerability
(38:05):
is so important and it's difficult. Sometimes it can be
very difficult for me personally in my taste. I always
find the music that I connect to the most is
where I feel just like I've been let in and
I'm just hearing candidness. It hurts. Sometimes it's like oh sugar,
or it's like not even for me just as a listener,
(38:26):
you know, you're like, oh my god, this is bringing
tears to my eyes. You know, if someone's telling your
story and you're just you have goosebumps all over your
skin and you're completely enchanted. And then it takes you
to somewhere in your life and then provide some sort
of aid or band aid we say, plaster, or some
sort of hug or some sort of space for you
to cry and feel it. So as a listener, that's
(38:48):
where I feel most moved. But it's definitely not an
easy thing to do.
Speaker 1 (38:53):
Was ice Cream Man? Was that a difficult song to
record and to Yeah, I.
Speaker 2 (38:57):
Mean, without a doubt, Yeah, definitely the whole. Yeah, that
one's deep. It's just deep, because my god, that song,
it's just I'm still you know, like a lot of
us are working through those things in it. But I
got a message the other day on my Instagram DMS.
Trying not to spend too much time on my socials
(39:18):
and stuff, but every now and then I have a
little look. And it was maybe about two days ago,
and I got this message from this lady and she
was about in her fifties and she sent me this long,
beautiful message. It was really sad message about her life,
and she was telling me about some of the things
she went through as a child and working through it,
(39:41):
and it was so moving. I was so moved. I
read it about six times. Even brings to his to
my eyes now, and I was just like, my goodness,
like some of us are carrying so much. And she
just expressed at the end of the message that she
was really grateful for that song because it gave her
the confidence to talk to someone that she loved about
(40:04):
something she'd beencerned about her whole life. There are so
many of us out here dealing with things, carrying things,
holding things. There's no instruction manual what to do. This
is where music is like medicine and provides a space
of healing or reflection. So as tricky is that song
is for me on the worst to days, I'm just
so grateful that even if it was only her, you
(40:25):
know that that's even been able to provide some sort
of I don't even know what the words are, but
I was just so mood.
Speaker 1 (40:32):
Do you perform the song?
Speaker 2 (40:33):
Yeah? I do now. Sometimes it's sad, sometimes I do
cry a lot. Sometimes I could sing it and I
feel really powerful. I feel really safe inside my music.
I think that's another thing that maybe allows me to
be so honest and vulnerable. It feels like if I
was just to say some of the lyrics in this
(40:54):
conversation with you, but without a melody and without the
safe space inside a song, I would not be comfortable
to do that at all, which is weird. But it
feels like within a song, it's on my terms in
the sonic bed. That feels like it's correct to lie
and it feels safe. It feels like no one can
(41:18):
spin this or nobody can have an opinion too negative
besides not liking the song, but they can't be like,
well I don't believe her, Well this and that, you know,
all the scrutiny that you can get from being open
and transparent about your life. But without a song, Yeah, you.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
Have a new single Genesis, and it's really great. But
when it started, I was like, okay, all right, like
we and then you know, three quarters of the way
through or halfway through, there's a change, and it's like
the most uplifting. The first half is a little it's
a little like, oh shoot, like this is like I
feel like I was a little worried as I guess
(41:57):
she's still in like a and by the end I'm like,
oh shit, it feels like I'm in preservation Hall and
new and it's like the lyric is what's the lyric about?
Light Like blood and lighting.
Speaker 2 (42:09):
They'd be l like, yeah, they'd be light.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
It feels maybe more like where your life is now
than some of the album, you know, I know that
feels true to you.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
Yeah. I think the Planners will put out the full
seven minutes and then the week after kind of split
them into three different songs. So you have Genesis one,
which is that kind of really sad reflection in the
mirror of depressing conversation with yourself someone. Song two is
that heavy whatever sound, and then song three is the
(42:39):
kind of big band vibe at the end, and I
think you can almost see it as maybe an EP
or something. But I wanted to put all the songs
in one and kind of force you to try and
have to listen to all of it just in one,
which is a lot and I think I really took
like a lot of passion and a lot of time
went into the lyrics for me and making sure that
(43:00):
it said what it needed to say. I wanted it
to be cutting and again honest, and I wanted to
talk about themes of you know, suicide and which is
again just I think also even for young men, I
think there's this kind of thing of like just feeling
things and not talking about it. I recently lost someone
(43:23):
who was really close to the family, just gone, you know,
and you didn't even know that they were going for anything.
Speaker 1 (43:29):
Suicide.
Speaker 2 (43:30):
Yeah, there's a lot of people just as you know,
fighting a lot of stuff. I wanted to create a
song that felt like if you are going for anything
like that, or you do feel in any sort of
way burdened or like you're going for a really tough time.
I wanted to create a piece of music that you
could allow yourself to feel it in the beginning, and
(43:52):
then the music kind of starts to lift you up
in the middle, even though the lyric is still heavy,
taking you maybe to a more powerful place to process
that emotion, and then by the end hopefully feeling some
positivity and some hope. So I wanted it to be
this journey of if any one even relates to one
of the sentences in that song, you know, And I
(44:12):
was trying to create an open scape of my honesty.
But then also what else are people our love or
people I don't even know going through or need from
this song? So it's quite a deep one, Yeah it is.
Speaker 1 (44:24):
Well, I'm so grateful you loved us with that we needed,
so we absolutely needed. Yeah, man, how are you going
to do that live? Well?
Speaker 2 (44:38):
Look, in my dream scenario, there will always be many
many musicians on the stage. From a cost efficiency perspective,
we're working now, but you know who needs to make
notes of money? Like who needs to do that?
Speaker 1 (44:52):
Sure? I mean travel with the big band? Bring them out?
You worked with Dark Child? I love Dark Child? Rodney Man,
how did you look about Rodney?
Speaker 2 (45:02):
That's my bro. I actually met him when I was
a kid, like my first trip to LA when I
was about seventeen, and I was taking some meetings and
I remember at the time I hadn't made anything good
enough to like really capture his attention. But I remember
thinking in my head like one day he's going to
hear my music and be like she's sick. Like I
remember that being a goal. And then we got connected
(45:23):
and maybe like two years ago, and got in the
studio and started working on what is this song? So
it's been a labor of love for quite a long time.
He's really brilliant and I have a lot of love
for him, and I put him through the ring.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
On this Tell me about it.
Speaker 2 (45:38):
Oh my god. I called him again and be like,
we need to fix the drums. I'm like, we need to.
You know, we had this original drum loop and I'm like,
it's giving, but it wasn't live. It had a live texture,
but some of the frequencies were too sharp and it
was jarring. And I was like, we need to it
needs to have the same feel, but it needs to
feel clean and a bit more raw and down to
(45:59):
earth and and not have that kind of distracting whatever.
And he'd be like, okay, okay. So we trapped different
things and then we go back and back and and
then it was like, finally, yes, we got it. So
we took the original drummer and made it like twenty
percent in volume and then played this new one over
the top so you still get that whatever. And then
I remember I was at the baseline. I think we
need a completely different melody to it. So then we
(46:21):
did this baseline where I basically recorded twenty and we
stacked and stacked and stacked, vocally manipulated it, put it
down the octave, and then played a symp with it.
Like there was so much experimentation and things that needed
to be changed, things that needed to be added, and
(46:42):
he was so patient with me because I'm so annoying
every little detail life Ronnie, we needed her, I'll call
him like Hi, Ray, Like hey, So, I was just
thinking that we need a new verse two, you know,
and maybe we do a string section. I even have
notes now, and we've handed in the master, and I'm
(47:04):
thinking maybe the vinyl is going to be different to
the version that's going to come out. I think we
need a more soft detexture on verse one because the
lyrics already so hard that you need some softness around it,
you know. And then we played these brass on SNL
that was so good that I'm like, we need to
add that in. So there's probably going to be some
changes in the vinyl of seven inch version that we
(47:27):
printed to what you're hearing now. Rodney's such a jeep,
like he's a legend. He's one of the best in
the game. He's just constantly leveling up, creating music that
just stands and tests the time wherever or some.
Speaker 1 (47:38):
Of the best singers Janet Tony Braxton, I mean, come on,
I mean just the greatest singers work As an album artist,
do you have a sense of what you want to
do next? I like to make an album, okay, but
doing it out like you do, you have a goal
that I want it to be by boom or you just.
Speaker 2 (47:58):
Like it just has to be good by my own standard,
and I think I'll need to live a little bit
to like make a really good album. Otherwise I'm just
gonna be writing about hotel rooms and winding roads and
nobody wants to hear that. So I need to go
and collect some stories as well and live a little bit.
(48:20):
I'm aware that it's a bit scary in the times
we're in with everyone having such short attention spans, and
you know, we're it's such an amazing place right now
that everyone's like, oh, well, when's the next shit coming on?
Like fucking hell damn, Like, I need to go. I
need to write. I'm not going to put anything out
that I don't love and I don't believe it's good,
(48:42):
and it's got to at least be a little bit
better than, in my opinion, the album we just put
out of what's the point, I mean, got be leveling up.
Speaker 1 (48:49):
Hey, well, I can't wait to hear it. I hope, Yeah,
me too, I can't wait to hear it. I'm sure
it'll be great. It's a great great talking to you
no like guys. Thank you. Thanks to Ray for speaking
so openly about her life, inspiration and her music. Her
new single, Genesis is out now everywhere. You can hear
(49:10):
a playlist of all of our favorite race songs at
broken record podcast dot com. Subscribe to our YouTube channel
at YouTube dot com slash broken Record Podcast, where you
can find all of our new episodes. You can follow
us on Twitter at broken Record. Broken Record is produced
and edited by Leah Rose, with marketing help from Eric
Sandler and Jordan McMillan. Our engineer is Ben Tolliday. Broken
(49:34):
Record is a production of Pushkin Industries. If you love
this show and others from Pushkin, consider subscribing to Pushkin Plus.
Pushkin Plus is a podcast subscription that offers bonus content
and ad free listening for four ninety nine a month.
Look for Pushkin Plus on Apple Podcasts subscriptions. And if
you like this show, please remember to share, rate, and
(49:55):
review us on your podcast app. Our theme music's by
Kenny Beats. I'm justin Richmond.
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