Latest / Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond / Maya Hawke
Transcript
- 0:15Speaker 1: Pushkin Pushkin. Learning to make it on your own without
- 0:33Speaker 1: your parents can be tough for any kid, but especially
- 0:36Speaker 1: if your mom and dad are superstars. Over the last
- 0:40Speaker 1: three years, Maya Hawk has managed to escape the long
- 0:42Speaker 1: shadow of her very famous parents with Irman and Ethan Hawk.
- 0:48Speaker 1: She's made a name for herself, first as an actor
- 0:51Speaker 1: in Stranger Things, Little Women in Tarantino's latest Once Upon
- 0:54Speaker 1: a Time in Hollywood, and now Mayah Hawk is breaking
- 0:57Speaker 1: new ground as a singer songwriter. Maya's debut album, Blush
- 1:02Speaker 1: is an invitation into her vivid inner life and her songs.
- 1:06Speaker 1: She's figuring out who she is out in the world alone.
- 1:10Speaker 1: The songs are clever, poetic, and raw. They touch on
- 1:14Speaker 1: the dynamic emotional life of a young woman navigating her
- 1:17Speaker 1: way through love, lust and disappointment. I spoke with Maya
- 1:21Speaker 1: recently from her family's home on Long Island. She speaks
- 1:24Speaker 1: candidly about how she honors all the various versions of
- 1:27Speaker 1: herself and why she slipped into what she calls her
- 1:30Speaker 1: sultry Cinderella character. During early live performances. You'll also hear
- 1:34Speaker 1: Maya talk about going to Graceland with her dad and
- 1:37Speaker 1: a song she wrote about their rocky relationship. This is
- 1:44Speaker 1: broken record liner notes for the digital age. I'm justin Richmondton.
- 1:53Speaker 1: Just a quick note here. You can listen to all
- 1:55Speaker 1: of the music mentioned in this episode on our playlist,
- 1:58Speaker 1: which you can find a link to in the show
- 2:00Speaker 1: notes for licensing reasons, each time a song is referenced
- 2:04Speaker 1: in this episode, you'll hear this sound effect. All right,
- 2:10Speaker 1: enjoyed the episode, Here's my conversation with Maya Hawk, But
- 2:14Speaker 1: before we jump in, here's my and her producer, Jesse
- 2:17Speaker 1: Harris on guitar performing the first single from Blush. It's
- 2:20Speaker 1: called by Myself. I was thinking about talking to you yesterday,
- 2:25Speaker 1: and I was thinking I first saw you first, even
- 2:29Speaker 1: knew about you from seeing Quentin's movie last summer. Yeah,
- 2:34Speaker 1: my wife watched The Stranger Things. I haven't really seen it,
- 2:36Speaker 1: but she knew you from that. But I was thinking
- 2:38Speaker 1: about how both of those things came out last summer.
- 2:42Speaker 1: So last summer must have been a complete whirlwind, and
- 2:44Speaker 1: what a difference like a year makes for me. The
- 2:48Speaker 1: part that feels like a whirlwind is the making of
- 2:50Speaker 1: the thing, Like the summer before, when I was filming
- 2:53Speaker 1: Stranger Things and sneaking away to film Quentin's movie and
- 2:57Speaker 1: like recording a bunch of music and like that summer
- 3:00Speaker 1: felt like a whirlwind. And then last summer of twenty
- 3:02Speaker 1: nineteen that was just a summer where things came out.
- 3:05Speaker 1: Setting it for To the public part, it is sort
- 3:07Speaker 1: of like, is that you know you want to hide
- 3:09Speaker 1: under the covers a little bit? Got it? Got it?
- 3:13Speaker 1: Obviously you're still young, but you've been acting for a
- 3:15Speaker 1: few years. And I tend to think I guess people
- 3:17Speaker 1: tend to think of actors as being just very free
- 3:20Speaker 1: with themselves, you know, and it's hard to imagine that
- 3:23Speaker 1: you aren't impervious to things like just feeling like, oh man,
- 3:26Speaker 1: this thing's coming out finally, and how's it going to
- 3:28Speaker 1: be perceived? And I mean, first of all, a lot
- 3:31Speaker 1: of the actors that I know are some of the
- 3:32Speaker 1: least free with themselves people I've ever met. I think
- 3:34Speaker 1: there are a lot of misconceptions about that. But I
- 3:37Speaker 1: also think there's a difference between being free with yourself
- 3:40Speaker 1: in the space that you're in where you can look
- 3:43Speaker 1: at every person in the room in the eye and
- 3:45Speaker 1: exist in your whole self in that moment when you're
- 3:49Speaker 1: recording the piece of work or on the stage and
- 3:52Speaker 1: you can look at the audience, or even at a
- 3:54Speaker 1: dinner party and you can look at everyone in the room.
- 3:56Speaker 1: There's a difference between that level of being an extrovert
- 3:59Speaker 1: and the level of being willing to take that extra
- 4:01Speaker 1: version and share it with millions of people or hundreds
- 4:05Speaker 1: of people. That's another level of bravery that I think
- 4:08Speaker 1: you almost have to be psychopathic not to be afraid of.
- 4:11Speaker 1: That's fair. I hadn't considered that, and I guess it's
- 4:13Speaker 1: almost a difference between doing things like this in person
- 4:16Speaker 1: and doing things like this over zoom. There's a bit
- 4:18Speaker 1: of control you lose between, you know, Like I guess
- 4:21Speaker 1: if you're doing something a stage production, even though there's
- 4:24Speaker 1: an audience out there and you don't know exactly who
- 4:26Speaker 1: they are, there's a bit of you feeling like you're
- 4:27Speaker 1: in control of what's happening to them, and the reactions
- 4:30Speaker 1: and things just go to air somewhere. You're like, You're like,
- 4:32Speaker 1: I don't know, okay, yeah, right, the energy is different,
- 4:36Speaker 1: you like, you know, and like also I probably present
- 4:39Speaker 1: myself differently if we've done it in person, Like I
- 4:41Speaker 1: just jumped out of the pool and throw on a
- 4:43Speaker 1: feature and sat down to talk to you, you know,
- 4:45Speaker 1: which is different than you know, if I'd come into
- 4:47Speaker 1: your office, I would have like picked out the right
- 4:49Speaker 1: pair of genes, you know, and like my hair probably right. Well,
- 4:53Speaker 1: I like we're gett into a more real version. The
- 4:55Speaker 1: more the more authentic, They're all equally real, you know.
- 4:58Speaker 1: I mean, I think that the idea of authenticity is
- 5:00Speaker 1: a very complicated idea, Like what is your authentic self? Is? It?
- 5:05Speaker 1: Is it when you prepare to meet people or when
- 5:07Speaker 1: you're unprepared, like when you're with your best friend or
- 5:10Speaker 1: with a complete stranger. Sometimes we're more ourselves with strangers
- 5:14Speaker 1: than we are with our family. And what does that
- 5:16Speaker 1: even mean? To be yourself? It really just means how
- 5:19Speaker 1: yourself are you being in that moment, right, Like any
- 5:23Speaker 1: self that you are will change from moment to moment.
- 5:26Speaker 1: I think for me, at least, it does. Absolutely. When
- 5:29Speaker 1: I was listening to your album, it feels like the
- 5:32Speaker 1: idea of identity comes up a bit totally. Yeah, I
- 5:37Speaker 1: think that's true. You think that in those years when
- 5:40Speaker 1: you leave the school system and you leave the family
- 5:43Speaker 1: system and you enter your independent system, whether you're twenty
- 5:47Speaker 1: six leaving grad school, or eighteen leaving high school, or
- 5:51Speaker 1: like I was nineteen leaving a first year of drama school,
- 5:54Speaker 1: and then you kind of hit the streets on your
- 5:56Speaker 1: own and you're living by yourself, and I think it's
- 5:59Speaker 1: a massive developmental moment for a person because you start
- 6:04Speaker 1: to realize who are you on your own? You know,
- 6:07Speaker 1: like it's the first one where you're really, for me,
- 6:10Speaker 1: at least, faced with the mirror reflection of like, Okay,
- 6:13Speaker 1: who have I become? And so? And this album was
- 6:16Speaker 1: written in those first three years that I was working
- 6:21Speaker 1: for the first time in the real business world and
- 6:25Speaker 1: living by myself for the first time, and having adult
- 6:28Speaker 1: relationships for the first time. And I think that, you know,
- 6:32Speaker 1: maybe in a narcissistic way, maybe not, all of those
- 6:35Speaker 1: experiences gave me moments to check in and look at
- 6:39Speaker 1: myself and say, Okay, wow, this is how I handled
- 6:43Speaker 1: X situation, This is how I handled why? Like interesting
- 6:46Speaker 1: that I have become this person? What person do I
- 6:49Speaker 1: want to be? How do I want to handle these differently?
- 6:51Speaker 1: How do I like? Do I like myself? Do I
- 6:53Speaker 1: like the way I handled that or not? And so
- 6:56Speaker 1: this album for me tracks a lot of those experiences,
- 7:01Speaker 1: So you're really taking account of you, of yourself, who
- 7:05Speaker 1: you are, I think. So yeah, I mean, I guess
- 7:07Speaker 1: I'm one of those kids who've been in therapy since
- 7:10Speaker 1: they were well over something, you know, So I generally
- 7:14Speaker 1: I'm self reflective to the point of it being a fault.
- 7:18Speaker 1: Like I think that people say to me all the
- 7:19Speaker 1: time where they go, well, I guess that sounds like
- 7:21Speaker 1: a complicated problem, but like it's amazing that you're so
- 7:23Speaker 1: self aware about it. And my response is I was like, yeah,
- 7:26Speaker 1: I'm self aware. I know, I'm self aware. That doesn't
- 7:29Speaker 1: mean I can change anything. Like just because I know
- 7:32Speaker 1: why I'm doing the crazy thing that I'm doing, doesn't
- 7:34Speaker 1: mean I'm gonna stop. Like I'm still gonna keep doing
- 7:37Speaker 1: that crazy thing. Like I'm not in control. I just
- 7:39Speaker 1: know what's out of control. That said, it's good to
- 7:42Speaker 1: know it's good. It is not as good as you
- 7:45Speaker 1: would think it is. It doesn't get you as far
- 7:47Speaker 1: as even would want it to to. So you wrote this
- 7:50Speaker 1: three three years ago. You started, So we started three
- 7:53Speaker 1: years ago. I just turned nineteen about it, and then
- 7:56Speaker 1: I kind of wasn't planning on making a whole record.
- 8:01Speaker 1: I just sort of had gone to my friend Jesse,
- 8:04Speaker 1: who is who I wrote this album with, and asked
- 8:06Speaker 1: him for some advice on a song i'd written on
- 8:08Speaker 1: my first job in that i'd done in Ireland, and
- 8:12Speaker 1: he gave me some advice and I was like, hey,
- 8:13Speaker 1: look like, if you ever want to write a song together,
- 8:15Speaker 1: I would love to just let me know. And because
- 8:17Speaker 1: he co writes with a lot of people and there's
- 8:19Speaker 1: a lot of stuff, and he was like, great, cool,
- 8:21Speaker 1: how do you want to do it? I was like,
- 8:22Speaker 1: maybe I just I'll send you a poem, and so
- 8:25Speaker 1: I send him a poem that I'd written and he
- 8:27Speaker 1: put it to music and that ended up being to
- 8:29Speaker 1: Love a Boy, which was the first single that we
- 8:31Speaker 1: ever made together. And then we just kind of kept
- 8:34Speaker 1: doing that without really, at least on my end, without
- 8:37Speaker 1: there ever being a plan to make an album or
- 8:39Speaker 1: really even to play a show, or like, I just
- 8:42Speaker 1: was enjoying having a place to put my poems. So
- 8:47Speaker 1: then we just sort of kept kept plugging along and
- 8:49Speaker 1: collecting songs and eventually had enough to play a show,
- 8:53Speaker 1: and we played a show, and then we put out
- 8:56Speaker 1: those singles, and then we got some attention from a
- 8:58Speaker 1: label who wanted to ask us we had enough for
- 9:00Speaker 1: an album, and we were like, yes, we do. Here
- 9:01Speaker 1: they are, and that's sort of how we ended up here. Now,
- 9:04Speaker 1: what was your first show? My first show is at
- 9:06Speaker 1: Rockwood Music Hall. I think I did like a twelve
- 9:09Speaker 1: song set with the band that I still play with.
- 9:13Speaker 1: How was that experience terrifying? I've only done probably twelve
- 9:17Speaker 1: shows in my whole livelong life. It started out being
- 9:21Speaker 1: really fun because I had so much adrenaline about performing
- 9:25Speaker 1: and so much nerves that I was kind of almost
- 9:27Speaker 1: totally unaware of what was happening around me. Like I
- 9:30Speaker 1: just would kind of stumble on stage and be like, Okay,
- 9:32Speaker 1: I'm gonna sing these songs now, and then by the
- 9:34Speaker 1: time it was over, like I blinked and it was over.
- 9:37Speaker 1: But then the more I did, the more I was
- 9:38Speaker 1: able to actually relax on stage and become aware of
- 9:43Speaker 1: the mistakes that I was making, the places I wasn't
- 9:47Speaker 1: being myself. I'll return to using that phrase that we talked, like,
- 9:49Speaker 1: the place that I wasn't being the version of me
- 9:51Speaker 1: that I wanted to be. I often have a character
- 9:55Speaker 1: that I can fall into. I've had it ever since
- 9:57Speaker 1: I was in like ninth grade, which I call like
- 10:00Speaker 1: sultry Disney princess, Like I've become like a slightly like
- 10:04Speaker 1: drunk kind of like sexualized Cinderella or something, and it's
- 10:09Speaker 1: like kind of bubbly and like, oh, like I'm gonna
- 10:12Speaker 1: say something really inappropriate, but in a really sweet way
- 10:14Speaker 1: so you don't even notice. And I hate her, like
- 10:17Speaker 1: she's just my worst enemy. I hate her so much.
- 10:21Speaker 1: And I was doing that character a lot on stage,
- 10:24Speaker 1: and so the more shows I did, the more I
- 10:26Speaker 1: realized how I could grow and get better. And only
- 10:30Speaker 1: my last show I ever played before COVID happened, which
- 10:32Speaker 1: was at Joe's Pub, was a show where I was like, Okay, cool,
- 10:35Speaker 1: I can stand behind that performance, like I feel good
- 10:39Speaker 1: about how I did that night. When did music become
- 10:42Speaker 1: part of your life in a real way? Music was
- 10:45Speaker 1: always a part of my life, primarily through my father,
- 10:48Speaker 1: who was just like a big music fan, a big
- 10:50Speaker 1: kind of old fashioned country music fan, like not pop country,
- 10:53Speaker 1: but like the good old stuff, Johnny Cash and that
- 10:56Speaker 1: kind of thing, and he that was sort of always
- 10:59Speaker 1: on in our living room. And Willie Nelson and Neil
- 11:01Speaker 1: Young and Bob Dylan and those sort of like great
- 11:04Speaker 1: old folk guys Leonard Cohen. Um, that was kind of
- 11:06Speaker 1: like the language of what was playing in the house.
- 11:09Speaker 1: UM when I was a kid, and I really fell
- 11:11Speaker 1: in love with that primarily still like through the poetry.
- 11:14Speaker 1: Like what moved me the most about it was the
- 11:16Speaker 1: was the language. Lines would get stuck in my head
- 11:19Speaker 1: and I would focus on them, and even as a kid,
- 11:21Speaker 1: like write poems based on those lines. Wow, any particular
- 11:25Speaker 1: lines that you remembered. And still I loved this song, um,
- 11:30Speaker 1: the song The Redheaded Stranger from from Blue Rock, Montana
- 11:33Speaker 1: wrote into Town one day, Um, and he talks about
- 11:36Speaker 1: in that song there's um he's wild in his sorrow.
- 11:40Speaker 1: Um is one of the lines in the chorus, don't
- 11:42Speaker 1: cross him, don't boss him, He's wildest sorrow. And I
- 11:47Speaker 1: wrote a poem when I was a kid called wild
- 11:49Speaker 1: in my Sorrow. No one writes like Willie, No one
- 11:51Speaker 1: writes So that's just yeah, yeah, get goosebumps here in
- 11:54Speaker 1: a line. Yeah, even over zoom. It's like and you're like, oh, yeah, yeah,
- 11:58Speaker 1: it's incredible. He's amazing and so and then my dad
- 12:01Speaker 1: also like is kind of a novice guitar player, as
- 12:05Speaker 1: am I UM and UM. We just kind of had
- 12:08Speaker 1: like jams sessions in the living room and we would
- 12:11Speaker 1: memorize songs together and sing them. We used to sing
- 12:13Speaker 1: Hungry Heart and this song called Blue Wing, and like
- 12:16Speaker 1: we just kind of had this sort of hoot nanny
- 12:19Speaker 1: like like you know, would you're surprise there wasn't a
- 12:23Speaker 1: harmonica in the mix, kind of guitar circle the two
- 12:27Speaker 1: of us in the living room when I was a kid,
- 12:29Speaker 1: So that was a big part of my upbringing. And then,
- 12:32Speaker 1: you know, my parents are divorced, and when, especially when
- 12:35Speaker 1: I was younger, when I'd have to spend a lot
- 12:37Speaker 1: of time away from my dad he'd go away to
- 12:38Speaker 1: work or something, he would give me these playlists. He
- 12:41Speaker 1: made me this playlist that ended up being actually featured
- 12:44Speaker 1: in a movie, to my great chagrin, which was like
- 12:47Speaker 1: a Beatles Black album playlist where he took songs from
- 12:50Speaker 1: every Beatle from after they had broken up and kind
- 12:53Speaker 1: of reconstructed a final Beatles album by combining them. And
- 12:57Speaker 1: he made me a playlist all of Dylan covers and
- 13:01Speaker 1: he'd like he would sort of mix it up, and
- 13:03Speaker 1: he made me all these great playlists to try to
- 13:05Speaker 1: teach me about music and Elvis playlist. So we went
- 13:08Speaker 1: on a road trip together to follow the life of
- 13:10Speaker 1: Elvis from like the first church that he was born
- 13:13Speaker 1: and where he got his first guitar. When was this,
- 13:16Speaker 1: I guess I was thirteen and you were into it
- 13:18Speaker 1: at thirteen, Like this wasn't like like you're forced along
- 13:21Speaker 1: anytime I got to spend with my dad. I was
- 13:24Speaker 1: into at thirteen. He mean, he's my hero. Um, A
- 13:27Speaker 1: few have a daughter. It's all all good, all goodness
- 13:29Speaker 1: coming up. She'll love you heart. And so we went
- 13:34Speaker 1: on this. Yeah, we went to where Elvis bought his
- 13:36Speaker 1: first guitar, and we went to the church that he
- 13:37Speaker 1: was born, and we went to Memphis and Sun Studios
- 13:40Speaker 1: in Nashville and then finally to Graceland. UM, so that
- 13:44Speaker 1: kind of I don't know, It's just always a part
- 13:46Speaker 1: of my life. I really considered myself, you know, a
- 13:49Speaker 1: fan more than anything else. And I still do. Like
- 13:51Speaker 1: I I'm not a great musician. I love to sing.
- 13:54Speaker 1: I sang my whole life. I was always inquired at
- 13:57Speaker 1: school and I love I love to sing, but I
- 13:59Speaker 1: don't I don't really know how to play an instrument
- 14:02Speaker 1: in any way that would impress anyone except like maybe
- 14:04Speaker 1: like a boy at a party one night or something
- 14:07Speaker 1: like I can vaguely that's useful. That's useful. Oh, trust me,
- 14:10Speaker 1: I milk it. But I milk those twelve chords. I
- 14:14Speaker 1: know to to heaven and back. But I love music
- 14:18Speaker 1: and I love writing poetry. And so the collaboration with
- 14:21Speaker 1: Jesse and getting to sort of like have access to
- 14:24Speaker 1: his brain and his amazing melodic thinking and that incredibly
- 14:27Speaker 1: sophisticated way in which he constructs melody, I feel like
- 14:29Speaker 1: we come together in a way that I really like
- 14:32Speaker 1: because it adds some roughness to his um sort of
- 14:35Speaker 1: like elegance, and he adds some elegance to my roughness.
- 14:39Speaker 1: We'll be right back with my Hawk. After a quick break,
- 14:47Speaker 1: we're back. Here's Maya Hawk and Jesse Harris performing her
- 14:50Speaker 1: song Generous Heart. Oftentimes you'll hear a song, a Neil
- 14:57Speaker 1: Young song, and it will sound like deeply personal, and
- 15:00Speaker 1: you'll find out, well, it was really about a character.
- 15:03Speaker 1: You know, he wasn't writing about himself. He was thinking
- 15:06Speaker 1: of someone else. I wasn't sure how much so that
- 15:09Speaker 1: was going on, But it seems like you're kind of
- 15:11Speaker 1: revealing yourself in this pretty public way with these songs. Yeah, Like, yes,
- 15:17Speaker 1: it is revealing. They are all the songs. When I
- 15:21Speaker 1: wrote them, at least felt extraordinarily personal. They now feel
- 15:24Speaker 1: more like characters to me, because the mood that I
- 15:27Speaker 1: was in when I wrote them doesn't feel like the
- 15:29Speaker 1: mood I'm in now. You know, if it was about
- 15:32Speaker 1: it was about a very powerful feeling or whatever that
- 15:34Speaker 1: I was having, then it's not a feeling that is
- 15:35Speaker 1: present in me. So in a lot of ways, when
- 15:37Speaker 1: I go to sing those songs again, it does feel
- 15:38Speaker 1: like a character I have to get back into the
- 15:40Speaker 1: Like for example, when I wrote Menace, I was feeling
- 15:43Speaker 1: tremendous shame over being an extrovert. I was feeling very
- 15:47Speaker 1: embarrassed about basically being a flirt. Like I was feeling
- 15:51Speaker 1: like I was in a relationship and like we were
- 15:53Speaker 1: just getting these constant fights about the way that I
- 15:55Speaker 1: would behave when I was out at a party or whatever,
- 15:57Speaker 1: and I really would make an effort to like make
- 15:59Speaker 1: everyone at the party feel good, and like I touch
- 16:02Speaker 1: people's shoulders a lot, and like I shared a lot
- 16:05Speaker 1: of myself with a lot of people, and I just
- 16:07Speaker 1: mean socially right, and we get we get into a
- 16:10Speaker 1: lot of fights about it because what he really wanted
- 16:13Speaker 1: from me in those scenarios was to like be on
- 16:15Speaker 1: his arm, and I was feeling really guilty about that.
- 16:18Speaker 1: I was like, fuck, like I'm a bad person, Like
- 16:20Speaker 1: I'm not being a good girlfriend. I'm I'm being a menace. Um.
- 16:24Speaker 1: And then you know that relationship ended and I now
- 16:27Speaker 1: sing that song and I'm like, what the frick was
- 16:29Speaker 1: I thinking? Like like I was being fine, like like
- 16:32Speaker 1: like like I don't need to spend all my energy
- 16:35Speaker 1: devoting to like coddling and eat, Like I can be
- 16:38Speaker 1: a social person and that's okay. How do you feel
- 16:40Speaker 1: when you sing it? Then? I mean beyond that, you
- 16:42Speaker 1: don't connect to the person, but in somewhere in your
- 16:44Speaker 1: head you know that you were that person. Does it?
- 16:46Speaker 1: Do you now feel almost ashamed to have been the
- 16:48Speaker 1: person who was embarrassed to be just an open person? Yeah?
- 16:51Speaker 1: I mean I usually, like before I sing that song
- 16:53Speaker 1: in public, I usually tell some version of the story
- 16:55Speaker 1: that I just told you, which then makes me kind
- 16:58Speaker 1: of feel better about it. And I sort of sing
- 17:01Speaker 1: it from the from the point of view of a
- 17:03Speaker 1: person who's like kind of lying about not wanting to
- 17:06Speaker 1: be a menace anymore, and like I focus more on
- 17:08Speaker 1: the lyrics of the verses, do you mind singing a
- 17:11Speaker 1: verse from it? Let's see first. The first lyrics of
- 17:15Speaker 1: the verse are, turn my gaze away, relieve the impressions
- 17:19Speaker 1: that I've made, like rain in my creeping hand. I
- 17:23Speaker 1: want to behave. It's a small concession all my regressions
- 17:26Speaker 1: I don't understand, but it's painful old news and pales
- 17:31Speaker 1: in comparison to choosing you. So it's so like there's
- 17:35Speaker 1: a certain kind of accurate statement of fact in the verses.
- 17:40Speaker 1: In the chorus is I don't want to be a
- 17:42Speaker 1: menace anymore. And that's what I feel detached from right
- 17:45Speaker 1: like now I feel like, no, I do want to
- 17:46Speaker 1: be a menace. Actually I'm fine with that. But in
- 17:50Speaker 1: the verses, those are more sort of statements of fact
- 17:53Speaker 1: and feeling and things that happened and so that I
- 17:56Speaker 1: can kind of more attach to as a memory, versus
- 17:59Speaker 1: this claim of how I want to change is what
- 18:01Speaker 1: feels more alien to me. It almost makes a song
- 18:04Speaker 1: cooler in no way, because it's now the course is ironic, Yes, yes,
- 18:08Speaker 1: exactly that's so I feel when I sing it now,
- 18:10Speaker 1: I'm like, this is an ironic chorus. But okay, I
- 18:13Speaker 1: like that a lot, because you know, you do sound
- 18:15Speaker 1: very sincere when you sing. It's like there's a certain
- 18:17Speaker 1: feeling I get listening to music that I get when
- 18:19Speaker 1: I listened to like a group, particularly like like The
- 18:22Speaker 1: Mamas and the Papa's Right. Oh yeah, I love that
- 18:24Speaker 1: when you listen to that music, there's they're really sincere.
- 18:28Speaker 1: They really pour themselves into the music, you know, And
- 18:32Speaker 1: listening to your album felt a lot like that same
- 18:34Speaker 1: experience for me. There are jokes all over the album,
- 18:38Speaker 1: but from like at least as a listener. I love
- 18:42Speaker 1: it when I'm listening to a song and I hear
- 18:45Speaker 1: the joke, but I feel like I'm the only one
- 18:47Speaker 1: who gets it, like if the maybe I take this
- 18:51Speaker 1: from acting a little bit, like when some actors will
- 18:54Speaker 1: wink at you while they're acting and they're like, this
- 18:56Speaker 1: is acting. You know, They're like they're like that was
- 19:00Speaker 1: a joke, this is acting, and they're like, I'm actually
- 19:03Speaker 1: a movie star, and you know, like there's a kind
- 19:06Speaker 1: of like a kind of like wink about it. Yeah,
- 19:09Speaker 1: And so I like it to hide the jokes and
- 19:12Speaker 1: hide the irony in total sincerity, so that if there
- 19:15Speaker 1: is that one person who listens to it twenty times,
- 19:18Speaker 1: they're like, oh my god, she doesn't mean that line,
- 19:20Speaker 1: or like that line is actually a slam of that person,
- 19:23Speaker 1: Like she's singing it like it's a compliment, but it's
- 19:24Speaker 1: actually as total disc like cool. Do you either a
- 19:28Speaker 1: couple of jokes or winks you can? You can let
- 19:30Speaker 1: us in on it. There are let me see if
- 19:32Speaker 1: I can think of them. They're all over um the
- 19:36Speaker 1: last song Mirth. The middle verse of Mirth is, um,
- 19:40Speaker 1: I've got a problem I think he could fix. He
- 19:43Speaker 1: seems to undo all my usual tricks, But the marks
- 19:46Speaker 1: on his belly and the lines on his face shadow
- 19:49Speaker 1: his softness and romantic grace. That whole song is sort
- 19:51Speaker 1: of secretly about there's two songs on the record that
- 19:57Speaker 1: this is an adult podcast. Yes, yes, okay, so the
- 20:00Speaker 1: two songs on the record that are kind of secretly
- 20:02Speaker 1: about not being able to orgasm and um, and I
- 20:08Speaker 1: never would have guessed that it's the first and last
- 20:10Speaker 1: song m like the last lines of Generous Heart, I
- 20:16Speaker 1: know it's my fault. I need to lie dead to
- 20:18Speaker 1: find a cascade towards something but dread. And that's secretly
- 20:21Speaker 1: about that. But I wouldn't want anyone to know or
- 20:23Speaker 1: find out. But to me, that's what it's about. And
- 20:25Speaker 1: so inside I'm winking and laughing. Well, only people are
- 20:28Speaker 1: listening to this. Yeah, I never would have got it.
- 20:32Speaker 1: That's your inside scool. Yeah, there we go, running with it.
- 20:37Speaker 1: Let's talk about so long a little bit. Um. I
- 20:40Speaker 1: love this sort of dissonant sound of this cool song.
- 20:43Speaker 1: I guess where does this song come from? I really
- 20:45Speaker 1: like this one a lot. This song is basically about
- 20:48Speaker 1: the idea that, like, if you have like a crush
- 20:51Speaker 1: that you've met a couple times or whatever, you can
- 20:53Speaker 1: start to think about them so much that they become
- 20:56Speaker 1: a character in your life that is different than the
- 20:59Speaker 1: person that they are. I mean, it's also happen. This
- 21:01Speaker 1: thing also happened a million different relationships. It can happen
- 21:03Speaker 1: in a professional relationship, whatever. But if you focus on somebody,
- 21:07Speaker 1: anyone really in your life, and you spend a lot
- 21:09Speaker 1: of your time alone thinking about them, they become this
- 21:12Speaker 1: other person, this sort of ghost character in your life
- 21:16Speaker 1: that is totally separate from the person that they actually
- 21:19Speaker 1: are my favorite lyrics in the song are all in
- 21:21Speaker 1: those pre choruses, and the first one is I'm not
- 21:23Speaker 1: a coward. I'm just afraid of all of the things
- 21:25Speaker 1: that I am, or of how quickly tomorrow coutunity yesterday?
- 21:29Speaker 1: And I know that doesn't you said these were written
- 21:32Speaker 1: long before this year, but I think those blinds stuck
- 21:36Speaker 1: out to me, particularly the pre course, because I think
- 21:38Speaker 1: I feel that way so much about our future moving.
- 21:41Speaker 1: You know, like and I know has nothing to do
- 21:43Speaker 1: with society or politics, or I mean, I mean like
- 21:48Speaker 1: everything has to do with society and politics. I mean
- 21:50Speaker 1: all of our interpersonal relationships, all of our are all
- 21:53Speaker 1: interacting with the world. I mean, if you think that
- 21:55Speaker 1: you can exist outside of society and politics, or outside
- 21:58Speaker 1: of the world even in your interpersonal relationships and feelings,
- 22:01Speaker 1: you're sort of delusional. I think, for Co would definitely
- 22:05Speaker 1: agree with you. Yeah, but how our tomorrow concerned you yesterday?
- 22:09Speaker 1: I think what I meant when I initially wrote that
- 22:12Speaker 1: line was that, you know, the idea of something is
- 22:16Speaker 1: so much is often so much shinier than the reality.
- 22:19Speaker 1: Sometimes it isn't, and that is amazing when that happens,
- 22:22Speaker 1: When the reality of something is even bigger and brighter
- 22:25Speaker 1: and more beautiful than the idea of it, but so
- 22:28Speaker 1: often it isn't, and the fantasy is so much kind
- 22:33Speaker 1: of more alive in you than the reality would be. Right.
- 22:36Speaker 1: But I think that that kind of can connect to
- 22:38Speaker 1: now in two ways, which is one like we're also
- 22:40Speaker 1: afraid of what's going to happen and that it will
- 22:43Speaker 1: be terrible, and like probably and maybe it won't be
- 22:45Speaker 1: so terrible, like maybe things will end up okay. I
- 22:47Speaker 1: don't know, or we end up putting away all our
- 22:50Speaker 1: fears and just being blindly optimistic and being like everything's
- 22:53Speaker 1: going to be okay, and that fantasy is so much
- 22:56Speaker 1: brighter than what will really happen. Probably. Yeah, I was
- 22:59Speaker 1: realizing too, the line I cannot hide my cards, can't
- 23:02Speaker 1: even keep them close that struck me, And then two
- 23:06Speaker 1: songs later coverage, Here's where I put my trust. If
- 23:09Speaker 1: you tell a lie enough, you can't pick it from
- 23:11Speaker 1: the truth. It's been of tremendous use. Yes, as you's
- 23:15Speaker 1: almost saying two different things about if they're in fact
- 23:17Speaker 1: about you. It's like there's these two different versions of you.
- 23:20Speaker 1: There's you you cannot help but show you can you
- 23:24Speaker 1: can't expose yourself, and then there's a party that's like, well,
- 23:27Speaker 1: I'm not really given too much of myself. I mean,
- 23:29Speaker 1: I think that's a wonderful observation, and I think that
- 23:31Speaker 1: that's really true. And that kind of plays into what
- 23:34Speaker 1: I was talking about about how each song, though there
- 23:36Speaker 1: were all pretty much written very personally, are different characters
- 23:40Speaker 1: because of the different moods and changes that I went
- 23:43Speaker 1: through while I was writing them. In life, like if
- 23:45Speaker 1: I'm at a dinner or whatever, everyone would know what
- 23:48Speaker 1: I'm thinking about when anyone is saying, Like all my
- 23:51Speaker 1: thoughts are written right across my face. Like if I
- 23:54Speaker 1: think someone saying anything stupid, it'll I'll make like I
- 23:56Speaker 1: just I can't control my face. So that's kind of
- 23:59Speaker 1: what I cannot have my cards dear, can't even give
- 24:01Speaker 1: them close sort of means is that if you get
- 24:04Speaker 1: me in the moment, I'm a terrible liar and I'm
- 24:07Speaker 1: totally responsive to whatever is happening. The scenario that line
- 24:11Speaker 1: and coverage is sort of about like how I do
- 24:15Speaker 1: like with memory and stuff. I have constructed memories for
- 24:19Speaker 1: myself that are totally false based on just repeating them
- 24:25Speaker 1: in my head and picturing them, like my parents got
- 24:27Speaker 1: divorced when I was pretty young, and when I was
- 24:29Speaker 1: a kid, I spent so much time sort of trying
- 24:31Speaker 1: to remember and hold on to the moments in which
- 24:34Speaker 1: they were together, that I have fully invented visual memories
- 24:38Speaker 1: of times that we're together that didn't happen. And I
- 24:41Speaker 1: believe in somewhat in the way that I believe in acting,
- 24:44Speaker 1: I believe that that is possible. I believe that like
- 24:47Speaker 1: reality is totally fragmented and exist in your head, and
- 24:50Speaker 1: you can create alternate realities for yourself, alternate consciousnesses for
- 24:55Speaker 1: yourself if you lie to yourself enough, and that as
- 24:58Speaker 1: a tool that can be used to tremendous good and
- 25:00Speaker 1: tremendous harm. And so I think both things like it's
- 25:05Speaker 1: a good catch. Those are very contrasting forces in my life.
- 25:09Speaker 1: We'll be back with more of my conversation with Maya Hawk,
- 25:12Speaker 1: but before we break, let's hear her play an acoustic
- 25:15Speaker 1: version of her song So Long. We're back with Maya Hawk.
- 25:24Speaker 1: Before we hear the rest of our conversation, let's listen
- 25:26Speaker 1: to the gorgeous song she wrote about her relationship with
- 25:29Speaker 1: her dad, Ethan Hawk. Here's Goodbye rocket Ship from Maya's
- 25:33Speaker 1: album Blush. There's moments of the album that are more
- 25:37Speaker 1: quiet and it's just you in a guitar, and then
- 25:40Speaker 1: there's moments where there's much more going into the song.
- 25:44Speaker 1: You know, there's there's the fault, you have a full
- 25:46Speaker 1: band behind you. You know. Yeah, it sounds like you
- 25:48Speaker 1: could have gone and kept the whole album acoustic. Was
- 25:51Speaker 1: there a reason? Did certain songs feel like they needed
- 25:54Speaker 1: something more to you? Or what did you? What did
- 25:56Speaker 1: you and Jesse decide on that? Like? How did that
- 25:58Speaker 1: come for me? It was again, like more about play
- 26:01Speaker 1: and experimentation than it was about the intention of making
- 26:04Speaker 1: an album, Like if I do this again, I think
- 26:07Speaker 1: I will Corey your graph much more sort of like
- 26:11Speaker 1: what I'm trying to do with the album sonically. Most
- 26:14Speaker 1: of the songs were recorded individually on this record, and
- 26:17Speaker 1: like also it was like we wrote we did Animal
- 26:20Speaker 1: Enough after we'd played a couple of shows and I
- 26:23Speaker 1: left this when I was like, I wish there was
- 26:24Speaker 1: a moment in our set where we could sing a
- 26:27Speaker 1: song that like would make people feel excited about the
- 26:29Speaker 1: fact that they have to stand, you know, like all
- 26:31Speaker 1: these songs I feel like you'd want to sit and
- 26:33Speaker 1: listen to these songs, and I want a song to
- 26:36Speaker 1: play in the middle of the show that makes everyone
- 26:38Speaker 1: want to stand up? Can we make one like that?
- 26:40Speaker 1: And as it was like sure, So it seems like
- 26:42Speaker 1: it's something you're really more and more getting into and
- 26:44Speaker 1: evolving yourself in. Does it feel like something you want?
- 26:47Speaker 1: I mean, is there a goal now? Yeah? I think
- 26:50Speaker 1: I definitely, like learned so much about music production and
- 26:54Speaker 1: music through this process, and I'm really excited to sort
- 26:57Speaker 1: of like take that information and go into another situation
- 27:02Speaker 1: and make something else. I'm excited to, like, rather than
- 27:05Speaker 1: doing an album kind of piecemeal the most as find
- 27:09Speaker 1: usual experience as I've had to have been like rehearsing
- 27:12Speaker 1: a set a bunch of times and then performing it
- 27:14Speaker 1: for people. And I would love to treat an album
- 27:17Speaker 1: like that. I would love to get a band together
- 27:19Speaker 1: and rehearse a set and then record the set. And
- 27:22Speaker 1: that doesn't necessarily mean like live like happy to do
- 27:24Speaker 1: overdubs and add things in, but to have this feeling like, oh,
- 27:29Speaker 1: we were constructing a whole experience from beginning to end,
- 27:32Speaker 1: and that was a part of it. In its performance
- 27:33Speaker 1: and in its creation rather than sort of a piecemeal collection.
- 27:37Speaker 1: In the beginning, there was a moment where I sort
- 27:40Speaker 1: of really tried to simplify the way that I write,
- 27:43Speaker 1: to kind of make kind of simpler songs. I was
- 27:46Speaker 1: sort of pairing myself back, like not in a bad way,
- 27:50Speaker 1: and like I was just I was really looking for
- 27:52Speaker 1: the most essential words, most essential feelings and really trying
- 27:56Speaker 1: to pair down. And then the stuff that I'm working
- 27:58Speaker 1: on now, I'm kind of letting myself pair back up,
- 28:01Speaker 1: like now that my information, like now that I'm thinking
- 28:04Speaker 1: about things in a different way and I know more,
- 28:06Speaker 1: I'm letting myself be sillier and like write songs other
- 28:09Speaker 1: people's perspectives and use sort of more poetically ambitious language
- 28:13Speaker 1: and add more jokes and be more silly. As you're
- 28:16Speaker 1: writing now, and I know you're saying you can feel
- 28:18Speaker 1: you can be more free, for you to do more,
- 28:20Speaker 1: for you to do less. What is your writing looking like? Now?
- 28:23Speaker 1: Do the songs feel any different? Yeah, they feel really
- 28:26Speaker 1: different to me. A lot of these songs on this
- 28:29Speaker 1: first album feel very developmental to me. And there are
- 28:33Speaker 1: also a lot of love songs on this album and
- 28:36Speaker 1: a lot of the stuff I've been writing now is
- 28:40Speaker 1: less that I wrote a song about about reputation and
- 28:43Speaker 1: acting in celebrity I've written I wrote a song about
- 28:46Speaker 1: one of my favorite authors. So I've kind of started
- 28:50Speaker 1: to do more to play more in the material that
- 28:54Speaker 1: is interesting to me. And I think that just makes
- 28:56Speaker 1: a lot of sense. I mean, like the ages between
- 28:59Speaker 1: nineteen and twenty one are very love focused years, and
- 29:03Speaker 1: even like using different tools to really write about the
- 29:05Speaker 1: same thing, Like yes, the song I wrote recently about
- 29:08Speaker 1: my favorite author is about my third author, but it
- 29:09Speaker 1: is also not like it's also sort of using that
- 29:12Speaker 1: as a device to talk about this person in the
- 29:14Speaker 1: way that they behave and how they remind me of
- 29:16Speaker 1: each other, you know. And I love how self aware
- 29:20Speaker 1: you are of like you know, particularly your age. You know,
- 29:23Speaker 1: I don't know that I was that self aware at
- 29:24Speaker 1: that time. Listening to your music, listening to your album,
- 29:28Speaker 1: I had a lot of the same feelings with surface
- 29:30Speaker 1: that I felt like I had ten years ago when
- 29:32Speaker 1: I was twenty twenty one. I think that's a really
- 29:35Speaker 1: great thing about music, is that music can make you
- 29:37Speaker 1: do that. And I think it's a really cool thing
- 29:39Speaker 1: that you did to be self aware enough to sort
- 29:41Speaker 1: of not try to write beyond where you are, sort of, yeah,
- 29:46Speaker 1: you just gotta be where you are. And that's still
- 29:48Speaker 1: what I'm trying to do now, is just sort of
- 29:49Speaker 1: be where I am. It's like where I am happens
- 29:51Speaker 1: to be, like in quarantine, spending a lot of time
- 29:54Speaker 1: online with the news, and a lot of time reading books,
- 29:57Speaker 1: and a lot of time like talking to my friends
- 29:59Speaker 1: on the phone, and and so I think it's just
- 30:02Speaker 1: all about being president in your current circumstance, writing as
- 30:05Speaker 1: honestly as you possibly can from the most potent version
- 30:08Speaker 1: of the feeling that you're having now, with an understanding
- 30:11Speaker 1: that feeling will fade and change, and not trying to
- 30:14Speaker 1: like encapsulate your entire person in one song, and also
- 30:19Speaker 1: not trying to run away from who you are in
- 30:22Speaker 1: the songs either. So much of your early musical development
- 30:27Speaker 1: was attached to family events, going on these road trips
- 30:29Speaker 1: with your family and just your dad making you these
- 30:31Speaker 1: great mixtapes. Was it fun to finally share any of
- 30:35Speaker 1: your music with your with your parents, with your dad
- 30:37Speaker 1: or your mom? It was? It's really fun, I mean
- 30:40Speaker 1: in the simplest way, like as a kid, I'm incredibly
- 30:43Speaker 1: proud to have done something and finished it, like you know,
- 30:46Speaker 1: I mean it's as simple as that, like to have
- 30:49Speaker 1: started a project and completed it and get to be like, look,
- 30:52Speaker 1: I made the thing. You can have it now like here,
- 30:55Speaker 1: Like uh, you know, it's like bringing your homework in
- 30:58Speaker 1: from school or you know, there's almost something dorky and
- 31:00Speaker 1: simple about that too, you know, just to sort of
- 31:03Speaker 1: be proud of having accomplished something and get to share
- 31:05Speaker 1: that with your family, and that's really special. And I
- 31:09Speaker 1: mean there's one song on the record that was that's
- 31:10Speaker 1: about my dad, the second to last song, and that
- 31:14Speaker 1: was an incredibly powerful experience to get to share that
- 31:17Speaker 1: song with him, because he and I had been sort
- 31:19Speaker 1: of fighting a lot and having a lot of different
- 31:21Speaker 1: conversations where you know, when you end up kind of
- 31:23Speaker 1: in the same fight with people and you keep you
- 31:25Speaker 1: say sort of like more and more horrible things that
- 31:27Speaker 1: you don't mean, just to sort of like try to
- 31:30Speaker 1: get to the core of whatever the feeling is that
- 31:32Speaker 1: keeps not going away, and you're like, well, if the
- 31:34Speaker 1: feeling still isn't going away, I guess him to like
- 31:36Speaker 1: do the worst, yea, Yeah, And so we're kind of
- 31:39Speaker 1: having the same fight over and over again. And then
- 31:41Speaker 1: I wrote this song and I've played it for him,
- 31:44Speaker 1: and and it was like I finally had said the
- 31:48Speaker 1: thing that I was trying to say a million times
- 31:51Speaker 1: in the kindest way and in like the truest way,
- 31:55Speaker 1: and in a way that because my father is an
- 31:57Speaker 1: artist and a writer, like a way he could really hear.
- 32:00Speaker 1: Like And that's what music has sort of always been
- 32:02Speaker 1: for me, is actually a way to present feelings to
- 32:04Speaker 1: people in a way that they can really hear. And
- 32:06Speaker 1: I think people often can listen better to art than
- 32:08Speaker 1: they can listen to words coming out of the mouth
- 32:10Speaker 1: of someone they love. So that experience of getting to
- 32:15Speaker 1: use music as a tool for communication in that way
- 32:17Speaker 1: and share it with my dad, who sort of created
- 32:20Speaker 1: my relationship to music, was a very powerful and positive one.
- 32:24Speaker 1: Did you preface to sharing that song with him as
- 32:26Speaker 1: this is sort of about you, or this is I've
- 32:28Speaker 1: tried to work out sort of how I'm feeling, or
- 32:30Speaker 1: did you just let him? I was sort of like,
- 32:32Speaker 1: I just let him. It's so obvious. I mean, within
- 32:35Speaker 1: our relationship, he would know from the fifth line. I
- 32:38Speaker 1: don't think I prefaced it there. Even there's a line
- 32:41Speaker 1: in the song that I stole from a song I
- 32:43Speaker 1: wrote when I was fourteen to him when I was like,
- 32:46Speaker 1: when I was fourteen, I wrote a song. I'd gotten
- 32:48Speaker 1: in trouble for lying, and I wrote a song to
- 32:50Speaker 1: sort of trying to get out of trouble. And the
- 32:52Speaker 1: chorus of the song was, you don't know how to
- 32:53Speaker 1: raise me anymore than I know how to grow up.
- 32:55Speaker 1: And that's a that's an indictment. My god, that's an indictment.
- 32:59Speaker 1: I know. So I took that line and I put
- 33:01Speaker 1: it into this new song. So he knew pretty quickly,
- 33:05Speaker 1: and it was the reaction. Did it feel like a
- 33:08Speaker 1: positive reaction? Yeah, I think it was very cathartic for
- 33:11Speaker 1: both of us. You know that's great. Cool. Do you mind?
- 33:14Speaker 1: Do you mind just singing like a line or two
- 33:16Speaker 1: of that song? Yeah? I do. You tell me like,
- 33:22Speaker 1: it's my idea. I came down to find you, pretend
- 33:27Speaker 1: that you're here, and I never could replace you. It's
- 33:32Speaker 1: too dark to try. But I look for our memories
- 33:37Speaker 1: and their clothing and their eyes. You didn't know, And
- 33:41Speaker 1: that's the first verse. It's beautiful. Thank you well, thanks
- 33:45Speaker 1: for taking the time to get out of the pool
- 33:48Speaker 1: and talk with them. Of course, any time. I always
- 33:50Speaker 1: happy to get out of the pool. Thank you for
- 33:52Speaker 1: being so kind, Thank you for listening to the record.
- 33:54Speaker 1: Is incredibly respectful and kind to do such a thing,
- 33:57Speaker 1: and I really don't take it lightly, that sort of
- 34:00Speaker 1: time and energy, and I appreciate you spending it on
- 34:02Speaker 1: my record, and I thank you for wanting to talk
- 34:05Speaker 1: to me. Thanks to my hot for aring so much
- 34:09Speaker 1: of her life and inspiration with us. You can hear
- 34:12Speaker 1: Mayahawk's album Blush by checking out our playlist at Broken
- 34:14Speaker 1: Record podcast dot com, and be sure to subscribe to
- 34:18Speaker 1: our YouTube channel at YouTube dot com slash broken Record Podcast.
- 34:21Speaker 1: We can find extended cuts of past episodes and also
- 34:24Speaker 1: new ones. Broken Record is produced with help from Leah Rose,
- 34:28Speaker 1: Jason Gambrel, Martin Gonzalez, Eric Sandler and his executive produced
- 34:33Speaker 1: by Neil LaBelle. Our theme musics by Kenny Beats. Broken
- 34:36Speaker 1: Record is a production of Pushkin Industries, and if you
- 34:39Speaker 1: like Broken Record, please remember to share, rate, and review
- 34:42Speaker 1: our show on your podcast app. I'm justin Richmond, Peace