Latest / HEAVY Music Interviews / Sonic Elevation With SAMANTHA FISH
Transcript
- 0:09Speaker 1: When I can the mirror dad who's staring back at me.
- 0:14Speaker 1: The world's again clearer.
- 0:16Speaker 2: But it's easier to see.
- 0:20Speaker 3: Hey everybody, I'm Samantha Fish and you're about to hear
- 0:22Speaker 3: a song off mighty record called paper Doll.
- 0:25Speaker 4: Let's do Itana, thanks for joining us today.
- 0:30Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you, my pleasure.
- 0:32Speaker 4: So you released a new album, Pipe Doll on April
- 0:35Speaker 4: to twenty, Like, it's still a little way away, But
- 0:38Speaker 4: how are you feeling is deciding to get to pressure point?
- 0:42Speaker 5: No?
- 0:42Speaker 3: I mean, honestly, oh god, there's there's this weird feeling
- 0:45Speaker 3: when you finish a record, at least for me, I
- 0:48Speaker 3: know every artist feels this way. You know, you're you
- 0:51Speaker 3: walk out of the studio and this giant weight has
- 0:53Speaker 3: been lifted off your shoulders. It's a much you for
- 0:55Speaker 3: when you're done with the record, it's like the pressure
- 0:57Speaker 3: is just like okay, like that's over, thank god, because
- 1:01Speaker 3: it's always fun, but it is like for me, it's
- 1:04Speaker 3: always like this mountain that I have to climb, you know,
- 1:06Speaker 3: to get through it, and it's you know, so it
- 1:09Speaker 3: feels great, but then it feels like you have the
- 1:10Speaker 3: secret that you have to keep for you know. Six
- 1:13Speaker 3: nine months a year they can't share with anybody. So
- 1:16Speaker 3: I finally feel like I'm able to like let.
- 1:18Speaker 2: People in on the little secret. That's that's kind of nice.
- 1:22Speaker 4: Good way looking at it. Can you just rub the
- 1:24Speaker 4: album chimmy from the musical point of view and then
- 1:26Speaker 4: what you're actually going for with it?
- 1:29Speaker 6: Oh?
- 1:29Speaker 2: God?
- 1:30Speaker 3: Well, this record, I wanted to lean into my strengths,
- 1:34Speaker 3: you know, what people might like, what are my super
- 1:36Speaker 3: power makes me different, what's what makes me unique? You know,
- 1:40Speaker 3: leaning into my voice, my guitar, my songwriting. I wanted
- 1:45Speaker 3: to make something that felt urgent, felt like rock and roll,
- 1:49Speaker 3: but was still rooted in the music that I love
- 1:52Speaker 3: and it inspires me, which is like blues music, you know,
- 1:55Speaker 3: uh North Hill country blues specifically. It's a deep well
- 1:59Speaker 3: of inspiration for me. I just wanted to write great
- 2:02Speaker 3: songs and write and record with an urgency that you know,
- 2:07Speaker 3: people would hear it and want to listen again and
- 2:10Speaker 3: again and again. You know, Timeless Records, that's my goal.
- 2:14Speaker 4: Nice. Now, it's the first one of your albums to
- 2:17Speaker 4: actually be pitched to me here an Australian heavy metal magazine,
- 2:20Speaker 4: So I'm guessing it's a lot more harder edged than
- 2:23Speaker 4: some of your previous albums.
- 2:25Speaker 2: You know, I think some of the songs are.
- 2:27Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I feel like maybe we just finally
- 2:31Speaker 3: worked our way to, you know, to get your attention.
- 2:34Speaker 3: I feel like I've written some pretty heavy music, but
- 2:37Speaker 3: I think the production on this definitely has, you know,
- 2:42Speaker 3: this this.
- 2:42Speaker 2: Rock and roll edge to it. Absolutely.
- 2:46Speaker 4: Yeah, And you opened it with a song called I'm
- 2:48Speaker 4: Done Running, which is a great introduction in music. It's tough,
- 2:52Speaker 4: it's catchy as hell, but it's gets up. It's just
- 2:55Speaker 4: got a driving beat to the whole thing. Is that
- 2:57Speaker 4: why you chose to open the album?
- 3:00Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, I think that the the okay, So
- 3:03Speaker 3: every time you sequence a record, it's like the committee
- 3:05Speaker 3: comes into play. I mean, I feel like that song
- 3:08Speaker 3: it's inviting, you know, it's it's definitely inviting. It kind
- 3:13Speaker 3: of prepares you for what's to come. But it's also
- 3:16Speaker 3: you know, I feel like it just sort of opens
- 3:18Speaker 3: the door to a record. It's so hard to sequence,
- 3:20Speaker 3: you know, I mean, you can you can make a
- 3:23Speaker 3: completely different album with the same set of songs just
- 3:25Speaker 3: through the sequence alone. So you know, I definitely have
- 3:30Speaker 3: my my sequences that I love that I prefer. But
- 3:33Speaker 3: you know, when when you bring everybody in, I think
- 3:35Speaker 3: that the consensus was that song is inviting, so let's
- 3:39Speaker 3: put it first.
- 3:40Speaker 4: Nice speaking, a sacred thing. Like in the modern I
- 3:43Speaker 4: h where a lot of music streaming and no one
- 3:45Speaker 4: really listens to an album start to finish, do you
- 3:48Speaker 4: still put as much fight as into your order the tracks?
- 3:52Speaker 3: I mean, I I think so if I want people to,
- 3:55Speaker 3: you know, it's important because if somebody is listening to
- 3:59Speaker 3: the what's going to keep them from going, all right,
- 4:02Speaker 3: I've had enough, I'm gonna listen to something else. The sequence,
- 4:06Speaker 3: you know, like putting putting songs in an order that
- 4:09Speaker 3: continue to like surprise you. You know, if you put
- 4:11Speaker 3: everything up front that sounds the same, people go, I
- 4:14Speaker 3: know what this record sounds like. I don't need to
- 4:16Speaker 3: listen to the rest of it. So I feel like
- 4:18Speaker 3: it's a journey.
- 4:19Speaker 2: You know.
- 4:21Speaker 3: Not everybody goes on that journey anymore. I mean, it
- 4:23Speaker 3: is twenty twenty five. A lot of people just go
- 4:25Speaker 3: to Spotify and find their favorite song and listen to it.
- 4:27Speaker 3: But I want to create the opportunity for people to
- 4:32Speaker 3: want to hear the whole thing. So I think sequencing
- 4:34Speaker 3: is important for that reason, you know, take people on
- 4:37Speaker 3: a trip. It's it's art Christ's sakes, Let's let's do
- 4:41Speaker 3: something with it.
- 4:42Speaker 4: Right. Well, you've released the singles I'm Done Running and
- 4:46Speaker 4: Sweet Southern Sounds, which are complete polar opposites of each
- 4:50Speaker 4: other musically, Like, is that an indication of the range
- 4:52Speaker 4: that's over the whole album?
- 4:55Speaker 2: Yeah, I'd say so.
- 4:56Speaker 3: I mean, I think that the idea is to kind
- 4:59Speaker 3: of continue to surprise people with the direction. Yet I
- 5:03Speaker 3: feel like those songs are different, but there is like
- 5:05Speaker 3: a there is a similar thread throughout. I think you
- 5:08Speaker 3: can kind of hear you know that there is a
- 5:11Speaker 3: blues like a rootsiness in there. Even though they go
- 5:14Speaker 3: completely different directions, there is there is some cohesive themes throughout.
- 5:18Speaker 1: You know.
- 5:20Speaker 4: Yeah, it's a musically like from my first listen on
- 5:23Speaker 4: at like, there's a beautiful mix of there's rock, blues,
- 5:26Speaker 4: you got hard rock, there's country, there's a bit of
- 5:28Speaker 4: soul in their light. How difficult is it to get
- 5:30Speaker 4: the balance of all of those rod in the creative prices?
- 5:36Speaker 3: I mean, I just kind of follow what feels right
- 5:40Speaker 3: for me. You know, these are all things that it's
- 5:42Speaker 3: not like I'm writing a song in a genre that
- 5:45Speaker 3: I have no uestion too, or you know, like simply
- 5:49Speaker 3: out of my comfort zone. I mean a lot of
- 5:52Speaker 3: everything that I write it comes from you know, comes
- 5:55Speaker 3: from my heart. So to make it all fit together,
- 5:59Speaker 3: I feel like there's there's already a cohesive thread involved,
- 6:02Speaker 3: you know, and so it to me, it's not it's
- 6:05Speaker 3: not too complex. And also I owe a lot of
- 6:08Speaker 3: that sort of you know, connection throughout the material to
- 6:13Speaker 3: the session. You know, when you're in there working with
- 6:16Speaker 3: the same musicians and producer, you're in you're in a room,
- 6:19Speaker 3: you're in a space, there is a vibe. It's like
- 6:22Speaker 3: a snapshot in time. So you know, it's not like
- 6:24Speaker 3: we're gonna make something way over here and it's something
- 6:26Speaker 3: that you know, it's all gonna feel like a family,
- 6:29Speaker 3: you know, like the songs kind of go together, even
- 6:32Speaker 3: if they're wildly different. There's there's still a connection. You know,
- 6:35Speaker 3: we're playing the same instruments, we're being recorded on the
- 6:37Speaker 3: same console. It's like there, it's a moment, you know.
- 6:41Speaker 4: And the my reason why I asked that is so
- 6:43Speaker 4: I'm pretty sure it was on the first song I'm
- 6:45Speaker 4: done running but it's started off like there's a country
- 6:48Speaker 4: Twain tour. Then I got a little bit of blues
- 6:50Speaker 4: in it, and then I go to hot rock. While
- 6:51Speaker 4: I was listening to it, I'm sitting down thinking like,
- 6:54Speaker 4: how the hell as she made this sound good from
- 6:57Speaker 4: day to day to dare. So that's why I asked
- 6:58Speaker 4: that question because from listen, okay, it doesn't sound like
- 7:02Speaker 4: it'd be an easy thing to play together.
- 7:04Speaker 2: Well, when you put it on paper like that, when
- 7:06Speaker 2: you like, you know, I think you know, I I
- 7:13Speaker 2: don't know. I just to me when I hear that song, it.
- 7:15Speaker 3: All, it all just kind of tells the story, right,
- 7:18Speaker 3: even if you're you know, if you listen to a
- 7:19Speaker 3: song on the record called Fortune Teller, it goes wild
- 7:22Speaker 3: different directions that it's unexpected.
- 7:25Speaker 2: But you know, that's that's the exciting thing about making music.
- 7:28Speaker 2: You want to make things that people don't know.
- 7:30Speaker 3: Exactly where it's going, but it's still if you can
- 7:32Speaker 3: find a way to make it work, that's the art, right.
- 7:35Speaker 4: Bake it till you make it. Yeah, now all read
- 7:40Speaker 4: in the press release where you said the album and
- 7:42Speaker 4: a lot of the guitars on it was inspired by
- 7:44Speaker 4: Mississippi Hills Country blues like I hear in Australia, that
- 7:48Speaker 4: doesn't really mean much for us. So what actually what
- 7:50Speaker 4: is that?
- 7:51Speaker 3: Well, you got to go pick up some Junior Kimbro
- 7:54Speaker 3: and some RL Burnside.
- 7:55Speaker 2: Go check out the Fat Possum Roster.
- 7:57Speaker 3: Yeah, North Hill Country is like a region in North Mississippi.
- 8:02Speaker 3: It's it's a very To me, it's like it's it's
- 8:05Speaker 3: like a mixture of I mean, it's Delta blues, but
- 8:11Speaker 3: there's like a heavy drum element involved. There's a drone involved,
- 8:14Speaker 3: and I you know, to me, growing up as a
- 8:17Speaker 3: kid in Kansas City and really loving rock and roll
- 8:21Speaker 3: and loving like, you know, Detroit in New York, when
- 8:25Speaker 3: I heard Hill Country blues music for the first time,
- 8:28Speaker 3: to me, it kind of felt like the same kindred
- 8:32Speaker 3: spirit to my favorite kind of rock and roll. This
- 8:35Speaker 3: sort of raw, loose, kind of like aggressive, you know,
- 8:40Speaker 3: give no fucks kind of a feel, and there was
- 8:42Speaker 3: nothing really super polished about it, and to me, it
- 8:46Speaker 3: just really spoke to me because and it just felt
- 8:49Speaker 3: really natural to go from.
- 8:50Speaker 2: Liking you know, like the Stooges to liking RL Burnside.
- 8:54Speaker 3: It all just sort of felt, you know, COHESI but
- 8:58Speaker 3: if you don't know about it, go check out some
- 9:00Speaker 3: records because it's.
- 9:01Speaker 2: It's the truth. It's the truth, the truth.
- 9:04Speaker 4: Yeah, there's also another quite from me and there that
- 9:06Speaker 4: all found really interesting. You said that it's taken me
- 9:10Speaker 4: years to fondly find more voice in a studio setting.
- 9:13Speaker 4: Can you elborate on that.
- 9:16Speaker 3: I get that quote a lot, and I regret saying
- 9:18Speaker 3: it like that because it sounds like.
- 9:21Speaker 2: It sounds so sad, no what I mean.
- 9:26Speaker 3: As a singer, and a lot maybe other singers can
- 9:28Speaker 3: really relate to this. Singing live on a stage is
- 9:30Speaker 3: completely different than singing with headphones on in an isolated
- 9:34Speaker 3: studio setting. For me, like my earlier recording is when
- 9:37Speaker 3: I listened to my voice, and I've grown a lot
- 9:39Speaker 3: as a vocalist. Like I'm not trying to short change myself,
- 9:42Speaker 3: because I put in a lot of work as a singer,
- 9:46Speaker 3: but I do feel like I was able to reach
- 9:49Speaker 3: areas of my voice and get comfortable in ways to
- 9:53Speaker 3: sing that I maybe haven't naturally been able to really
- 9:57Speaker 3: tap into. I think I was just starting to kind
- 9:58Speaker 3: of tap into it with death, Wish and faster, you know,
- 10:03Speaker 3: like there wasn't there wasn't a ton of restraint in
- 10:06Speaker 3: my vocals, Like I was able to do the thing
- 10:07Speaker 3: that I do naturally on stage in a studio, which
- 10:10Speaker 3: kind of feels good because you're like you have these
- 10:12Speaker 3: aha moments all the time as a musician, you know, like, oh,
- 10:16Speaker 3: you know, this little thing unlocks.
- 10:18Speaker 2: This big thing.
- 10:20Speaker 3: And that's really what I meant by that quote, not
- 10:22Speaker 3: that like I was stifled creatively and I wasn't able
- 10:25Speaker 3: to be myself or anything. I just I felt like
- 10:29Speaker 3: my true actual singing voice, like I find I was
- 10:32Speaker 3: I kind of unlocked something. Was was able to go
- 10:34Speaker 3: to places that I don't think I've been able to
- 10:36Speaker 3: quite go to in the past.
- 10:38Speaker 4: Nice Paper Doll was written and created mostly on the
- 10:42Speaker 4: road this time, which is different for you. So was
- 10:45Speaker 4: it a difficult process touring and writing?
- 10:51Speaker 3: It's how I've always done it. It's always it's always
- 10:55Speaker 3: like it's always like that. You know, you have to
- 10:57Speaker 3: find time and make it when you can. I did
- 11:01Speaker 3: have some to I remember early on in that writing process,
- 11:04Speaker 3: I did have some time off at home, and you know,
- 11:07Speaker 3: I mean sometimes you need a bit of a ticking
- 11:09Speaker 3: clock to be productive, you know.
- 11:11Speaker 7: Like like it helps it helps to know like, Okay,
- 11:15Speaker 7: I have to I have to be ready at this time,
- 11:17Speaker 7: you know, and so it just sort of like motivates
- 11:20Speaker 7: the creative process even further, you know.
- 11:23Speaker 6: But I don't know.
- 11:24Speaker 2: I mean, I write a lot about.
- 11:26Speaker 3: The road, about my experiences, so you know, sometimes sometimes
- 11:30Speaker 3: getting out there and doing it, it's it's great fodder
- 11:34Speaker 3: for inspiration, you know.
- 11:37Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 11:38Speaker 4: They also said in there to you that it's the
- 11:39Speaker 4: first album you've recorded with your touring band, Like do
- 11:42Speaker 4: you normally use session musicians?
- 11:46Speaker 2: I have in the past.
- 11:47Speaker 3: Yeah, then it's not because it was some you know,
- 11:51Speaker 3: it was never like a decision like I chose to
- 11:54Speaker 3: use these musicians and not these musicians. It's just, you know,
- 11:58Speaker 3: every album has kind of been like you knows who's
- 12:02Speaker 3: working on it, where are you at, you know, what,
- 12:05Speaker 3: what's the band's situation like in this moment. Sometimes you know,
- 12:08Speaker 3: like during the faster recordings, I didn't have a band
- 12:11Speaker 3: at the time because it was the pandemic, you know,
- 12:14Speaker 3: so things were you know, you you bring in different
- 12:18Speaker 3: musicians at different times for different things because of many
- 12:20Speaker 3: different reasons. But this album, we were on the road
- 12:25Speaker 3: touring all over the place, like and just completely crazy
- 12:30Speaker 3: touring schedule, and you know, I had a really good
- 12:33Speaker 3: energy in a chemistry with this band, so it just
- 12:37Speaker 3: felt right natural to go into the studio and continue
- 12:40Speaker 3: that momentum that we had on.
- 12:41Speaker 2: The road and on the stage into the studio setting.
- 12:44Speaker 4: They're nice. So what's the next for Samantha fish Off?
- 12:47Speaker 4: The album comes out of fand slot. If you do
- 12:49Speaker 4: nothing but record and sure, that's about it.
- 12:53Speaker 2: Man, that's kind of a life.
- 12:56Speaker 3: That's kind of a life, gul you know, it's not.
- 12:59Speaker 3: I feel like I love being on stage. It's where
- 13:03Speaker 3: I feel most at home. I love creating a show
- 13:08Speaker 3: that's different from my previous shows. I like the challenge of,
- 13:13Speaker 3: you know, getting to reimagine everything and make it make
- 13:16Speaker 3: something new for the.
- 13:18Speaker 2: Fans, you know, And I just really feel at home.
- 13:21Speaker 3: On stage, you know, like it's it's just it's a
- 13:23Speaker 3: good feeling place for me.
- 13:25Speaker 2: So I don't mind it.
- 13:27Speaker 4: So if your plans to make it to Australia in
- 13:30Speaker 4: the new future, because all come.
- 13:33Speaker 3: Twenty twenty six, they are the rumors that I'm hearing,
- 13:35Speaker 3: but nothing is confirmed. So this is not an official announcement.
- 13:38Speaker 3: It's a goal, it's a goal yeah, twenty twenty six. Nice.
- 13:43Speaker 4: Now, before you go, saman So, I've got a new
- 13:45Speaker 4: thing I've started doing called fighto bombs. So basically, before
- 13:49Speaker 4: I speak to you, I'll tell you social media. I
- 13:51Speaker 4: come up with a few fighters that don't want to
- 13:52Speaker 4: ask you more about Okay, I one of you that
- 13:57Speaker 4: proves that you do have a be to meddle in
- 13:58Speaker 4: your veins.
- 14:01Speaker 3: Halloween yeah, well yeah, I mean I don't know. I
- 14:08Speaker 3: always do Halloween up pretty big, I gotta say, which
- 14:13Speaker 3: is so funny, Like we've I've gotten, I've gotten so much.
- 14:17Speaker 3: You know, I love to dress up really really ugly
- 14:20Speaker 3: on Halloween because I have to dress up pretty the
- 14:23Speaker 3: rest of the year. So you know, it's my opportunity
- 14:26Speaker 3: just to go as you know, disgusting as I want,
- 14:30Speaker 3: you know, dark disgusting.
- 14:31Speaker 2: Let's go for it.
- 14:32Speaker 3: But that was one of my best I mean, I
- 14:33Speaker 3: use the special effects horns and you know, that was
- 14:37Speaker 3: a fun look.
- 14:38Speaker 2: That was a good one, very nice.
- 14:40Speaker 5: And the other one I found was.
- 14:45Speaker 4: Do you seriously play in high hills and then negotiate
- 14:49Speaker 4: your pedal boards with them on?
- 14:51Speaker 8: Yeah?
- 14:52Speaker 6: I do.
- 14:52Speaker 2: Hall the hell I got the back problems to prove it.
- 14:58Speaker 2: Just say good.
- 15:00Speaker 3: You know, Honestly, those stilettos kind of create like a
- 15:03Speaker 3: nice little point, so it's easier to push the buttons
- 15:07Speaker 3: than when I'm like when I wear big like I'll
- 15:09Speaker 3: wear my doctor Martins to sound check, and I'm like
- 15:11Speaker 3: stamping on all the buttons at the same time, Like Jesus,
- 15:14Speaker 3: how how do people do this with their regular big,
- 15:18Speaker 3: clumsy shoes on. I feel like you kind of have
- 15:21Speaker 3: to have a nice, narrow little point to be precise.
- 15:24Speaker 4: I'm saying other photos, if you jump it all over
- 15:27Speaker 4: the place on side Joe, you just shouldn't happen. You
- 15:30Speaker 4: shouldn't be out to jump and move and should just
- 15:32Speaker 4: like that.
- 15:34Speaker 3: It's a I don't know, man, I've seen some photos
- 15:38Speaker 3: that I'm like, why did I date that? That's it
- 15:40Speaker 3: gives me like intrusive kind of like, oh, I could
- 15:44Speaker 3: have broken ankle. I can definitely see how that juke
- 15:47Speaker 3: probably would have let you know, led me somewhere dangerous.
- 15:49Speaker 3: But I don't know, you know, you feel it in
- 15:51Speaker 3: the in the moment, like I just know I'm gonna land.
- 15:54Speaker 2: I have this, Like I just know I can do it.
- 15:58Speaker 2: That's what That's what the stage to you.
- 16:00Speaker 3: It gives you all kinds of like confidence and it's
- 16:03Speaker 3: like you should not have confidence like that in stilettos
- 16:06Speaker 3: for sure.
- 16:08Speaker 4: Then if you need to should should not have confidence?
- 16:12Speaker 2: Yeah, it's math.
- 16:15Speaker 4: Well, thanks very much for your song. The album hyper
- 16:17Speaker 4: Dole He's out Eiffel twenty fifth and take it from
- 16:19Speaker 4: a middlehead. It's a seriously fucking good album. So gratulations
- 16:23Speaker 4: and ipades.
- 16:25Speaker 2: Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Can't wait to
- 16:27Speaker 2: come see y'all down there. Thank you.
- 16:38Speaker 1: When I can. The mirror Dad who's staring back at me.
- 16:43Speaker 1: The world's again clearer, but it's easier to see. I'm
- 16:48Speaker 1: turning into some one that I never know. Pastor is
- 16:54Speaker 1: coming none done, but I like where I am going. No, No,
- 16:58Speaker 1: I'm changed and agent.
- 17:02Speaker 5: Watch me go.
- 17:13Speaker 1: My window.
- 17:14Speaker 2: I see both the sun and rain.
- 17:17Speaker 1: No one's not here without.
- 17:20Speaker 5: A dose of DNA pain. You'll try to leave.
- 17:23Speaker 1: The birds skin or on the bruising battery lightning so heavy.
- 17:29Speaker 1: Lord wants yourself to shattered. I know want change and
- 17:33Speaker 1: shag and.
- 17:36Speaker 6: Watch me go, Chancey come man closkey, dying man z.
- 17:56Speaker 8: Clke hine man, long time, I'm mad, Sam.
- 18:04Speaker 5: Ray Clear.
- 18:34Speaker 1: We'll not like in the mirror, stand up the hindle,
- 18:39Speaker 1: well not get clearer, but like.
- 18:42Speaker 3: Where I'm going.
- 18:45Speaker 5: Keep come classy, go mad, tear him, but.
- 18:54Speaker 8: Clocks going come mad, don't tear them. Has kept man
- 19:06Speaker 8: clowny b S, cloudy.
- 19:14Speaker 5: S long talk, Come man you Sam
- 19:23Speaker 8: Sloss Sip super