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December 7, 2024 15 mins

Kiwi indie-pop star Rita Mae has been making waves in New Zealand since 2021 - but she's been gaining more international attention.

In 2023, Rolling Stone tipped her as one of the next Kiwi artists to take over, with the magazine labelling her as an artist with 'a bright future.'

She says her new Kiss The Sky EP was inspired by her own temporary boosts of confidence - and she rode the feeling into this new project.

"And then these really overconfident songs came out of it, which was quite surprising to me because I usually see myself as a bit more withdrawn and shy - but I was writing these lyrics and I was surprised."

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Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudkin
from News Talks EDB.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
This year is Kiwi indie artist Rita May. One of
her latest singles, Big Star. Last year, Rita was named
as a Rising Artist Tip to take over the music
scene by Rolling Stone. Her new EP, Kiss the Sky
is out now and Rita is back from la and
with me here in the studio, Rita May, welcome in.

(00:33):
Good morning, Good morning. How long have you been in
the US for I was there.

Speaker 3 (00:38):
For like two and a half months, just riding and recording.

Speaker 2 (00:43):
You're not based there.

Speaker 3 (00:44):
No, No, I just do trips when I can afford it.

Speaker 2 (00:48):
And what's it been like for you?

Speaker 4 (00:49):
Yellow?

Speaker 3 (00:50):
It's been good. It's a pretty pretty crazy place. Like
I feel like the short stint suit me quite well
because it's quite over stimulating. And then I get to
come home to like my mum's house and Muddy Way
and decompress, which is nice when you're there.

Speaker 2 (01:07):
Are you there for a reason like to record? And yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:10):
Yeah, well my management's based there, and a couple of
my favorite people to collaborate with love there as well,
so it's kind of go there and like I wrote,
most of this EP over there and then come back
and focus on the sort of putting it together and
release side of things.

Speaker 2 (01:28):
And who are these favorite people you like to collaborate with?

Speaker 3 (01:31):
Well, actually, there's kind of one main producer there that
I love working with. His name's Kyle Burzel. He's a
really good friend of mine. Also, Leroy Klampett worked on
Big Star of this project, and another person I collaborated
with on this project was Josh Bruce Williams.

Speaker 2 (01:50):
This is a really dumb question, but how do you
meet these people? I mean, how do you go from
writing music in New Zealand to hooking up and finding
people that you want to work with and good friends
in Los Angeles.

Speaker 3 (02:02):
It's not a dumb question. It's because America is scary.
In LA is very big and intimidating, and I was
really lucky I have just a few friends there already.
I'm friends with Caleb and Georgia from Brutes, Yes, and
so they've obviously spent lots of time there. And I
have a good friend Noah Barrison, who on my first trip,

(02:25):
I basically just went because I thought it would be fun,
and it was very naively optimistic. I was just like,
I'm just gonna go and see what happened. And then
I went with two months planned in LA and absolutely
no sessions booked. And then my friend Noah pretty much
took me under his wing and was like, I know

(02:47):
some producers I can like take you decisions and stuff.
So it's sort of just so.

Speaker 2 (02:52):
It is really the old fashion way, well fashion way
to introduce people who know people pretty much.

Speaker 3 (02:57):
I tried really hard with the cold Instagram, direct messaging
and stuff, which I got a few a few connections
from that, but I'm not the best at doing that,
and I feel like I just I do like meeting
people just the old fashioned way, I guess, which I
feel like it was a bit of a luxury to
get to do it that way because it doesn't always

(03:19):
work out that way.

Speaker 2 (03:20):
Absolutely, tell me a little bit about Kiss the Sky,
your new EP. What was the inspiration behind it?

Speaker 3 (03:25):
Kiss this Guy? It was, I guess, a sort of
project that I guess showed itself to me through a
lot of writing. It's not like I went in with
this sort of plan of what I wanted it to be.
I was kind of writing five or six songs a
week at the time, and I guess this theme of

(03:46):
sort of like overindulgence kind of revealed itself to me
as I was writing. I was just feeling this kind
of very bizarre like false confidence at the time, and
I knew it was a bit of false confidence, but
in a nice way, like I was just sort of
enjoying feeling like a bit and you know how your

(04:07):
periods applied, but you just feel a bit invincible and
you know you're not.

Speaker 2 (04:12):
But I just.

Speaker 3 (04:13):
Felt like being like, I'm just gonna ride this feeling.
And yeah, these really overconfident songs came out of it,
which was quite surprising to me because I'm usually I guess,
seeing myself as a bit more sort of withdrawn and shy.
And then I was writing these lyrics that I was
surprised that I was saying them.

Speaker 2 (04:33):
That's awesome though.

Speaker 3 (04:34):
Yeah, it was really fun, and I think this the
project has kind of almost carried that confidence into a
more real one. It's like, the more I sing these
songs and say these things, I'm like, oh.

Speaker 2 (04:46):
I actually hate on about I got this.

Speaker 3 (04:49):
I kind of feel that a little bit.

Speaker 4 (04:51):
Oh.

Speaker 2 (04:51):
I love the way you're just so aware of these little,
these little steps that you're that you're that you're sort
of taking along the way you are an independent artist
at the moment. Does this allow you to do that?
Are you able to just work out who you are
as an artist and do what you want to do?
And obviously there are there's pros and cons right, yeah,
to how you exist in the music industry.

Speaker 3 (05:12):
Yeah, I used to resent being independent because obviously there's
a lot more pressure on You're the person that decides
everything at the end of the day, and you end
up funding a lot of it, and you know, there's
obviously a lot of difficulties to it, but the freedom
is a pretty big plus. Like, I don't no one

(05:34):
can tell me that I can't release something, and it
just means that, like I can write so freely and
just embrace whatever feeling is there at the time without
being like, oh my god, well well the team like this,
Like I have a manager, but he's very like do
your thing, girl.

Speaker 2 (05:53):
Yeah, and it must be wonderful to have female artists
like dolgre not and I think you know unlessa.

Speaker 3 (06:00):
Yes, she was the person I forgot to meet.

Speaker 2 (06:02):
Yeah, yeah, so you know it must be great. Had
some really interesting experiences in the industry. Yeah, do you
find that women are really good at that? You know,
these other female artists are really good at supporting and
kind of guiding process, I.

Speaker 3 (06:17):
Guess, especially female artists. I'm lucky to be surrounded by
lots that have actually had lots of positive and negative
experiences in the industry. So I feel like I'm having
this amazing sort of wealth of advice from people that
have actually been through a lot of versions of being
in the industry before. So I feel like that's quite

(06:39):
a luxury. I have these sort of big sisters that
can help me through what as I.

Speaker 2 (06:45):
Hear about you were at University of a Tago starting neuroscience.

Speaker 3 (06:49):
I did, I did do that? That feels like a
like a fever dream.

Speaker 2 (06:56):
So that's quite a They're quite different things. Did you
finish the degree.

Speaker 3 (06:59):
Or did you have Oh you did qualified?

Speaker 2 (07:02):
Well done? As a parent, can I just say good
on you for getting the degree and mean going my.

Speaker 3 (07:10):
Grandma, my grandma, I was like, I'm probably never gonna
use this degree, and she was like, honey, it shows
stickability and thank you love. Yeah, it shows that I
can even if I'm not having the best time, I
can see it through.

Speaker 2 (07:25):
I think it's wonderful though, that you're doing what you're doing,
because you're clearly very talented and I just love your sound.
But you know, it's funny. I read that and I
was like, as a parent, I'm like, oh, good on you,
you've got something. If you had to fall back I had,
I'm sure you won't. But you kind of go, yep,
that's great. You were gonna go, yes, that's what you
thought you would do with it.

Speaker 3 (07:43):
Well, originally I was hoping to be a doctor. My
original plan. I have a lot of fault, like crazy optimism,
I'm realizing as I sort of go through my career
because I was like, well, I don't want to I
want to have security, and but I also don't want
to give up on music stuff. So my plan was

(08:03):
to somehow be a full time doctor and a recording
and touring music artist, like I genuinely thought I could
do that. And then it turns out that being a
doctor is like pretty time consuming. You can't really just
do that in a chill way, and so yeah, I

(08:25):
kind of realized that halfway through, and I was just like, oh,
I'm here, and I honestly just didn't have the guts
to start on the music journey. Yeah, I was just
like I was in Dunedin halfway through my degree, kind
of enjoying the obvious structure that UNI provides. It was
just like you just have to go to these lectures

(08:47):
and you have to do these exams and stuff, which
was quite nice for me at the time because I
felt quite sort of untethered. But I think it also, weirdly,
in a sort of reverse psychology way, helped my music
because it meant it was this like huge special treat
if I got to go right, if I had time
to do that. So I don't know. I think it

(09:09):
was like I got my degree, and it also made
me like more hungry for the music stuff, so I
was really gassed up to torture.

Speaker 2 (09:16):
Some stickability to b there you go. I mean, you
grew up in a house filled with music, and this
is going to aige me terribly. But your father was
a member of the Jean Paul Satra Experience, which I
saw under age at the Carlton Hotel in christ Church. Gosh,
what would have that been then, late eighties? Maybe yeah, yeah, cute.

(09:38):
So obviously music's very much been a part of your life.

Speaker 3 (09:42):
Definitely. Yeah, Mom and dad like it was just sort
of the culture of our household I think was just
playing music and singing, and I feel like me and
my sisters were kind of writing, attempting to write songs
from like primary skill sort of age. Like it was

(10:02):
just sort of just felt like the thing you do.
It wasn't this thing that we're like, oh, we're gonna
learn to write songs now. It's just we were around we're.

Speaker 2 (10:10):
Going to be Taylor Swift.

Speaker 3 (10:11):
It was, oh, there was a phase of that. I
wanted to be Taylor Swift at one point, but yeah,
it was kind of just this like dad was always
writing and playing guitar and stuff, so we were like,
we want to do that too.

Speaker 2 (10:24):
And performing. Did dad always come naturally to you or
did you have a bit of performance anxiety?

Speaker 3 (10:31):
I think performing the performing anxiety, I know. I don't
think there was even really a thing like nerves were
a thing. But I was always pretty keen to play
my little songs on stage. My primary school actually had
lots of had a really amazing music teacher that she
did like band nights and stuff where you write your

(10:52):
song and perform for the whole school. And I was
always so keen to do that like it was scary,
but it's always been pretty fun. I think I've always
liked the attention quite a bit.

Speaker 2 (11:04):
Well, in that case, we'll get you to perform for
us and got on. Let's whip out a little performance here.
What are you going to perform for us?

Speaker 3 (11:11):
I'm going to perform when you Go, which is the
last single from a EP that came out recently, very recently.

Speaker 2 (11:20):
I love it all right, let's do it.

Speaker 3 (11:34):
If you don't come when you're.

Speaker 4 (11:40):
Better, I know that it's over. If you don't come
out to see the best.

Speaker 3 (11:51):
Better, I know you found another.

Speaker 4 (11:55):
So when you go, ask you to stay.

Speaker 3 (12:06):
I've always known.

Speaker 4 (12:11):
I want to stop along the way.

Speaker 5 (12:19):
You learn the words to every song Arrow, That's when
I knew that you loved me. Then turned up back
out to my show. That's when I knew you forgot me.

Speaker 3 (12:41):
Yeah, when you.

Speaker 4 (12:42):
Go, I won't ask you to stay.

Speaker 5 (12:52):
This heart can't pay.

Speaker 4 (12:57):
I never loved you, so.

Speaker 6 (13:06):
Ran La Black campol Voics Nether breath on.

Speaker 3 (13:16):
You, but I've just say it.

Speaker 6 (13:19):
Bound Somba, clash my mouth, clean up your cash, bass, you.

Speaker 4 (13:35):
Got your name, stuff on.

Speaker 6 (13:38):
The lap, sacking, stop talking body so fast?

Speaker 4 (14:03):
When you start calling me fat. That's all that a
last year. Oh Suthy again, that's.

Speaker 5 (14:20):
Aster beautiful voice, beautiful song.

Speaker 2 (14:26):
Reta May, thank you, and I've just noticed a winning
bend on your figure. Did you just get married?

Speaker 3 (14:32):
I just got married. That is so exciting, like literally
like a week ago, literally a week ago on Friday.

Speaker 2 (14:37):
Congratulations it got It's been a big year, isn't it big? Yeah? Yeah, Reda,
thank you so much for coming in, very much appreciate it.
Can we start saying where into Merry Christmas? Mary, Chris,
Let's just start saying there, Let's just do it.

Speaker 3 (14:51):
There we go done.

Speaker 2 (14:54):
You can find Reta May's new EP, Kiss the Sky
on all streaming platforms now.

Speaker 1 (14:59):
For more from the Sunday session with Francesca Rudgin, listen
live to news Talks It'd be from nine am Sunday,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio
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