Adia Victoria is a blues, southern gothic, rock artist who has released 3 records via Atlantic Records, and worked with producers such as Aaron Dessner and T-Bone Burnett. We talk about losing and regaining your sense of self after years of endless touring, writing in motion, the major role of nature in her life and upbringing and much more.
Adia Victoria is a blues, southern gothic, rock artist who has released 3 records via Atlantic Records, and worked with producers such as Aaron Dessner and T-Bone Burnett. We talk about losing and regaining your sense of self after years of endless touring, writing in motion, the major role of nature in her life and upbringing and much more.
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All music written, performed, and produced by Aaron Shafer-Haiss.
[00:00:07] Aaron: Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Other 22 Hours Podcast. I'm your host, Aaron Shafer-Haiss.
[00:00:11] Michaela: And I'm your host, Michaela Anne. And since this podcast is still relatively new, thank you so much for checking us out if it's your first time, and thank you for coming back if you're a repeat
[00:00:22] Aaron: listener.
Yeah, all you repeat listeners, thank you so much. We know there are thousands or even millions of podcasts to choose from, so the fact that you're coming back means a lot to us. If you have a second and you haven't done so already, if you could please just click and rate us on your listening platform of choice or on YouTube if you're watching us on YouTube, there's not like a really big discovery algorithm for podcasts like you have on Spotify or iTunes for music The one way we can get in front of new listeners is having a good rating And the more listeners we have the more guests we can get and the more guests we get the more ideas we can share and we like to say this is a Show that's for our community from our community so we're reaching out to you guys as our community to help us Get in front of more people.
We're
[00:01:05] Michaela: not your typical promotional show We like to talk to artists about their off cycle times not promoting records not promoting tours We want to know the stuff behind the scenes the tools the routines they found helpful in staying inspired Creative and sane while building a career around their art
[00:01:23] Aaron: And with so much that's outside of our control in the music business, we wanted to focus on what is within our control.
And so we decided to invite our friends on to have a conversation about the other times that are normally outside of the public eye and ask them the question, What do you do to create sustainability in your life so that you can sustain your creativity?
[00:01:40] Michaela: and today's guest is Adia Victoria, a blues singer based in Nashville, Tennessee. And Adia has put out some incredible records, worked with the Nationals Aaron Dessner, T Bone Burnett. She's been signed to Atlantic Records. She's played all the festivals.
She grew up in South Carolina and the South plays a very prominent role as her main muse in her music.
[00:02:07] Aaron: we talked a lot about nature and about her new house in the woods outside of Nashville. We talked a lot about how she likes to travel to Paris and writes a lot there, and likes to write while she's walking and the rhythm of the body while it's moving and how that kind of.
taps into your subconscious, which is something I thought was really cool. We talked a lot about losing yourself to your stage self. You'll hear my dumb analogy of relating that to like the mask, the Jim Carrey movie where the mask takes over and you can't separate yourself.
Touched on that a lot and pulling the parachute and stepping back from that as an artist. Yeah,
[00:02:41] Michaela: it was a really honest and vulnerable conversation.
Talked about redefining idea of success over and over for yourself and how to stop your mind from spinning on, I have to catch up, I have to achieve. So without further ado, here is our conversation with Adia Victoria.
you for talking to us and, really appreciate it. you home in Nashville right now?
[00:03:05] Adia: Yeah, I'm home our cabin in Ashland City.
Yeah,
[00:03:09] Michaela: didn't know you lived
[00:03:10] Adia: plants, and Kurt Cobain.
[00:03:11] Aaron: Amazing. Awesome. It's so beautiful up there.
[00:03:14] Adia: Yeah, we closed on this place actually Valentine's Day of last year. And we've got nine acres and it's just a blessing. Every day I wake up, it's just a blessing. Oh, that sounds amazing.
[00:03:26] Michaela: Know I like explained over text what this podcast is and really talking about life as an artist and creative and specifically musician the scenes and outside of promotion times and wanted to just jump right in with this tweet that you tweeted recently that already reached out to you. And then I saw this and tweeted, I knew mid pandemic that I no longer wanted or was able to tour the way I did before COVID. grind of the music business was destroying my soul. When I released a Southern Gothic, my hope was that it sustain me longer than an album cycle.
And you, you the people that book you and that you work with and said, most importantly to y'all for truly sitting with this record and coming out to support the band when we roll through town. Thank you for giving me the ability to create. Thank you. share art in a way that aligns with what my soul needs.
Capitalism turns art into content machines. I believe there is a more humane and sustainable way to share art with our fans. Thank you all for proving me right. So I saw that and I was like, yes, this is exactly what we're talking about and what the reason we made this podcast is because we have no plan B. This is what we're doing for life. And lot of this business is. be honest, pretty fucked up and can mess up life and having conversations the scenes with a lot of our friends and wanted to it into the light and try and share it more publicly.
So can you talk a little bit about, you that statement and experience and process coming to terms with that and making that decision?
[00:04:52] Adia: So by the time the pandemic hit, I'd pretty much been touring non stop for five years. Yeah. And I realized that my relationship with myself had taken a huge hit, my expectations, my values, they'd suddenly become completely outside oriented. It was no longer about creating art. It was no longer about something that I did for my own self or my own sake.
It was always with an attached external goal. And you realize once that happens, that those goals become like a carrot that you're always chasing. And I found that I was no longer satisfied. Like. With anything, like I would accomplish something and be like, okay, what's next? What's next? Mm so subtly.
I didn't realize how much of myself had been taken from me. And so by the time the pandemic hit, it was kind an opportunity for me to reclaim my own sense of orientation, my own sense of values, my my own sense of self. And it felt good. I forgot what what meaningful rest meant. I forgot what taking space and taking a breath meant.
And it wasn't until I was literally forced into doing that, was like, I miss this. I miss this woman that I was, I miss. relationship with myself, I missed the sense of groundedness and security. And I realized how much being on that wheel of promotion and constantly writing and constantly putting out content and output.
I became an object to myself. I was an object for for me to exploit for my own ends and you The labels ends fans ends and I was depleted. I didn't realize how depleted I'd become and so When I released Southern Gothic, I knew, I was like, I can't get back on that wheel, I can't get back in that machine, that grind, sat dissonance with my soul, turned me to an asshole. I was like, I don't want to be this asshole who my entire life is just promoting my life. I want to live my life with more intention and purpose. I want to get back in touch with my relationships that I neglected because of work and the name of career, accomplishing things.
And just been very mindful with a Southern Gothic of, I cannot live for this record. This record needs to live for me. And anybody that's going to be a fan of mine or appreciate my art, they're going to have to get on my timetable learn how to sit with things uh, longer than an album cycle, longer than like a streaming service algorithm tells you, Oh, here's something new,
[00:07:12] Aaron: yeah. Uh, lot of that resonates with me and resonates with, you same kind of shift that happened with us during the pandemic. What does that look like? in practice for you now that of the world is returning because is like a major why we started this podcast is because lot of people in our circle felt this way then when things opened up again, it was like snap right back to old habits and go even further off the cliff So i'm
wondering what
[00:07:37] Adia: Yeah, make up for lost time, that kind
of thing,
[00:07:40] Aaron: exactly
[00:07:41] Adia: Jesus Christ. So I released the Southern Gothic in September of 2021, when things were still kind and go. And then beginning of 22, we were back on the road time, promoting the record, playing shows. And in October, my husband Mason, also in my band, we got married and we realized we didn't want the first year of our, our life as a married couple to be spent tour.
It's like, is a new phase of our life that we're going to have to adjust to and get to know each other in a new way. And. I've really been putting that first, like being a wife and a partner and spouse and someone that is a homeowner for the first time. And, got cats here that these are my kids.
These are all the only kids we're ever going to have. So it's so much more to my life other than performing, other than being a businesswoman or artist. And I realize it. Everything in my life goes into making art. I was sitting outside today, pruning some of our garden, and I was like, This is part of writing a poem.
This is part of writing a song. So I'm starting to see act of creation in a wider way. More, integrated way. do I stop writing? It's writing is just sitting in the studio for hours with my guitar and a notepad, you know, it's taking a walk through the woods. It's watering my plants.
It's time spent with my husband. Like trying to find a way to be more wide reaching And creating art, that makes sense.
[00:09:05] Michaela: Yeah. you feel daily basis or not a daily basis, but every once in a while, like that itch or that push of like, you better get back out there or you need to be achieving and where's your ambition? And I'm asking this cause I feel that.
[00:09:21] Adia: Yeah.
[00:09:21] Michaela: And I fight it the same things you were saying of like, I don't to be driven by those things. There's so much more to life. So when that itch comes, if do you handle that?
[00:09:31] Adia: make sense that you feel that too. I, definitely have those intrusive thoughts of like, wasting time, like you're not producing anything. Like it's like I have to justify presence. And Yeah.
we, it makes sense that we feel that way because we've grown up in a capitalistic system that tells you that you're only as good as your last accomplishment.
And We grew up in a system that's actually antithetical to the sense of contentment, the sense of knowing when enough is, the sense of, listening to your body when it says, I need to rest. I need to, inward. I need to recuperate, regroup. And for me, when I, those things. The first thing that I'll do is just like, I just ran out the house and into the woods, honestly, like I just run, I just like, okay, I gotta get out of the house, I'll find the nearest cat and I'll pick up my cat and just like around with it. I try and reorient myself back into my body because that, voice that's talking to us, that internal, manager is so disembodied.
It's so foreign to who I am in my body will immediately realize, okay, I've left my body. out into the woods for me has been, medicinal. It's really hard to be depressed or anxious when you're standing in the middle of, of a forest, you are so present. You are so in that moment.
know, and all of those thoughts are forward thinking thoughts. Those anxious thoughts of I need to be doing this. I need to be doing that. It's right now do I need to be doing that? bills are paid, no one's going hungry. anything, that's just my ego saying, I need some attention.
I need some validation. It's like, hug a tree, kid.
[00:10:56] Michaela: Yeah. Yeah. And I think what you were saying about, you valuing, like just got married and prioritizing your, home life and you're building a home and your relationship with your animals. And it seems. almost a feel like a little embarrassed or shameful to admit like some of the aha moments I've had in the last year, but like, had our, daughter, like midst of the pandemic, or when things first started coming back.
So then I felt like a woman, like, now I'm delayed even more. And this narrative of, you know, a mother prohibits you or limits you is so deeply ingrained in me
I've fought a lot of little creeping feelings at times of like, Oh, well, I'm not keeping up with my friends who are my peers.
is somehow like race or like, we're all trying to do things in the same time.
I've never once thought look at what I've accomplished in my personal life. Like, at what I've built my home life and look at the experience I get to have as becoming a parent and my experience with my child. was really shameful to me or upsetting when I realized, whoa. have not valued this or put this on the same elevation as I have outside ambition or achievement.
I've never once thought, my friends who are out there touring nonstop maybe they've coveted family life I've been building. I've never thought that I'm rational and logical enough to understand that that's like, product of the society we live in and the outward messaging.
it really bothered me to realize that. And that's why I love these conversations of like people who are consciously saying, wait, why are we doing what we've just kind of been like trained to do in this American society that's built on capitalism that is literally, we exist to always need make more and buy more.
if we changed our thinking?
[00:12:50] Adia: Yeah. I think about that. a woman who is a musician and public persona, whatever, how much it's ingrained in us women to devalue. accomplishments outside of anything that's like male centered or male valued, had a baby like, good for you. Like, it's almost like, well, yeah, of course you're supposed to do that or, setting up a home like, yay.
Like, That doesn't matter. Like how, is that going to, you further your goals? And, And for me, it's I guess it's because I, I up poor and I was just happy to have a little bit, you and I experienced homelessness so my youth that being able to have this home and be at home is the biggest accomplishment for me to, have a husband that I adore and that I am devoted to.
And I can. Make a home with and have peace. Like That is my greatest accomplishment. I honestly, as much as I love performing and I do like, trying to like shit on, my career, I enjoy it, but it's really hard for me to remember specific moments that, with me, you and.
sister, she just had a baby, my younger sister. And so I'm an auntie for the first time. I met her last month, my little uh, niece Dahlia. And I held her and I smelled her hair. hmm. Never going to forget smell and the feeling of holding this baby. And thinking of like, can't wait to become part of your life and get to know you.
Like, these are things now that am driven to have time for. make time for after the pandemic, you know, I feel like in 2019, if she'd been born, I'd be like, all right. Yeah, cool. Great baby. Okay. I gotta go,
you know, off the tour.
festival. Yeah, but and making good money now, but my life can't just be making money and getting accolades and accomplishments for what it's what's the use of this.
success and I realized I now have become successful enough where I can be at home and To be okay with that, you know I think a lot of that go go go thing is also like a trauma response in a lot of us of never feeling safe Or never feeling secure So we have to keep going And you just spin yourself out But now I saying no to more things where it's like I could do that make a few extra grand, but I don't need that.
That doesn't serve my soul. I need to be home. manager's probably going to listen to this and be like, Oh, the lies.
[00:15:08] Aaron: Well, I also think that that go, go, go mentality top of being a trauma response is also an avoidant response. think like when you slow down, you inevitably have to face these vulnerable feelings in yourself of not achieving or I'm not achieving at the level that I thought I was going to be.
You have all the stuff that you need to face, like, when you're on tour, it's a suspended reality. every day is different, but it's pretty much the same. You wake up, you eat, you drive, you load in, you soundcheck. And so it's the same thing over and over again.
You don't really have to think about things. Your days are just...
[00:15:37] Michaela: And you feel like you're doing something. So like, you feel like you're being productive or you're working towards a goal where, like you said, like spending time in your garden and filling your, you cup to could be just as, if not more, productive in building your, life and your career as going on tour for a hundred dates a year, which, but the outside stuff that has been ingrained in us to think, that's the thing that we need to value.
also think the you were saying about like as women to not value like home life, I think that's the pendulum swinging the other way of like feminist movement of okay, if as women, we want be respected and of equal value in society, we need to take on the role of men and then like reject everything that we considered feminine I think ultimately, hopefully, someday, it'll be like, yeah.
Maybe equality is just letting everybody do whatever the fuck they want.
[00:16:30] Adia: Yeah. never bought into that kind of corporate white feminism of women can go and finally work and go into the workplace. And, you can stand shoulder to shoulder with our men. It's like, well, the last thing that the world needs is more people with the mindset of white men.
[00:16:44] Aaron: you're fine. No, understood. No, no, no. Understood.
[00:16:47] Adia: you know, it's not good for white men either. Like they're falling over from heart attacks at 50 from being overworked and not taking care of themselves. And, And also too, it's like, ancestors, I come from a legacy of, enslaved black women. It's like, anything, I'm their greatest dream because I can sit at home and.
Soak my feet and, watch my stories and rest, you it's not a big thing for black women to finally be able to work. It's been working.
[00:17:11] Michaela: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:17:12] Adia: We've been working. We've had to be strong for everyone. It's like, me, I'm like, I'm not a strong black woman. quite frail. I'm quite weak.
You know, I'm tired. And, for me, it's like. Taking off that burden of having to be the strong black woman of having to always, you resilient. It's like, I'm not. I am Tinder. I do want to be domestic. I do want to be in my home. I do want to make my husband a meal because I love him. You do want to be in my garden think it's. More importantly, like so much everyone being able to do whatever they want, but it's in society, it would be great if we could cover these base needs where people didn't have to work X amount of jobs just to barely afford rent let's take care of people's medical bills and schooling like, then you're going to allow people to work with so much less of a, gun at their head, you this myth that gets like, ingrained in us when we're young, like you got to be a hustler, like an entrepreneur.
It's like, not everybody wants that for their life. Like would be content working at a grocery store if I knew that I, my healthcare was covered. If I knew schooling was covered, if I didn't have to worry about these basic things, it's I want ease. I want peace in life. I, at the point now I'm turning 37 next month.
really don't care about external validation. You know what I mean? I've struggled and I don't romanticize that. I don't romanticize being in the world of men. nothing validating about that. It's quite sad. This is Olive. Hey, olive Live.
Yeah. You're going to hear her on the podcast. Yes.
[00:18:34] Michaela: No, I hear, all of that. And crazy to me that that kind of thinking is in our country and today's society is considered radical. And that's what, I mean, belief system is as well. Again, why I love conversations like this and trying to just contribute that I'm reading this book that I can't stop talking about essential labor, mothering for social change by Angela Garbus.
And it's just her talking about like, if we lived a different way? What if we like, know, valued caretaking? It's not just about mothering. It's about valuing caring for each other. And. belief system and what she's sharing in her book is literally just her talking about like, What if we did things this way or this way?
And the more I read it, the more I'm just like, Yes! Yes! Like,
I'm
[00:19:20] Adia: a good investment.
[00:19:21] Michaela: talking about home so much is interesting to me because when When we were preparing for this conversation, I was noticing that place plays a large role in your work, in your music, in what you write about.
Um, also reading that you've spent time, and writing in Paris and it feels like your surroundings. Has a very big impact on you and your creativity. Can you expand on that a little bit you think that is? Or, that maybe has evolved over your aging?
[00:19:55] Adia: a Southerner, I think the place plays a very distinct role. That's different from any other American. I think that the Southerner, the relationship that we have with the land, the history of the land, the way that the land is fused with the people that grow, I like to say that grow on it, not just like up there.
We grow on this land. It has spiritual dimensions to it that go beyond just saying like, well, I'm from Minneapolis, there's A weight being from the South and I, recognize that as a young girl, I grew up in um, South Carolina, upstate, foothills of the Blue Ridge mountains and very religious community, very religious household.
But I noticed I didn't feel anything closer to what they were talking about God than I did when I was out in nature. I was commuting with nature. was shaping me, informing me. And that's been a feeling that I've never been able to shake. sing a lot about my Magnolia tree and I remember up underneath that tree and so many of the games that I would play with my little friends and my sisters and my cousins would be formed by that tree, climbing that tree, you sitting in the shade underneath its limbs.
literally formed my mind and the Ridge mountains that I could see from my grandmothers. window my mind. It shaped the way that I viewed the world and I felt the world. And I think because so much of the history of the South is still unresolved, and a lot of that is tied to the land, that there is this tension.
There is this... internal conflict that bleeds out into the natural world around you. And so for me, I think the South is always going to be my main muse. I'm never going to get tired singing about it, writing songs about it, spending time in it, questioning it. And I think that's one of the reasons why I have been that said, I'm being home is now that I have a home for the first time in my life. I feel like I need to be here in relation with it. when we moved in last summer, I planted a magnolia tree. I've got a little baby magnolia. It's got its first little blossom, month. I was like, yay,
[00:21:55] Aaron: yeah!
[00:21:55] Adia: that's a tree that's going to take 30 years to come to full maturity.
I've never been in one place for 30 years. So as that tree grows and I grow old, we're going to grow together. already written death plans when I die, I'm going my body's going to be broken down and put at the root of that tree. And I find that when I'm touring and I'm away from home, my relationship with the South, it changes.
Like when I go to Paris, I have this remove, I have this distance where I'm able to see the South almost clearer because I'm not in it, still in conversation with it. But I think just that remove me kind of like a palate cleanse as an artist where I can stand outside of something that is of me and I can write about it in different ways. I can write it about it from different perspectives with I can let go of some of the baggage when I'm over Paris. And that's why I go there repeatedly. I studied French in school in college. My plan was to move there before I started doing music.
But now it's just my little writing getaway place, and I'm just able to use different parts of my brain. using language differently. My senses are heightened because I have to listen closer. I have to observe things. I have to look twice. And I take all sharpened senses, and I look back at the South, them.
I
[00:23:06] Aaron: that kind of your favorite way to create? It's be in a place, live it, absorb it, harvest, and then go somewhere else and be able to process and produce?
[00:23:16] Adia: it's my favorite way, but it's just one of the ways that I've been blessed enough to be able to. do, I will say that I write my best songs when I'm walking. And in Paris, it's of course, it's a walking city. And when I first moved to Nashville, I didn't have my driver's license. So I was, you walking to catch the bus, to school.
And something about that rhythm that I have to be in my body to write a song. It's really hard for me to just sit cold and write. I have to be moving. I have to be in relation to, something around me. And I just find that walking is a great way to build up that internal rhythm.
editor kind of shuts up, mind kind to a meditative place when you're in motion and it allows more things to rise up than if I was like sitting down, like hunched over a composition book with my guitar.
[00:23:58] Michaela: think also listening to you talk about going to Paris and leaving and the South being your muse, such a long history also of artists and like American expats, going elsewhere to then still write about their homeland. I mean, famously James Baldwin.
And that you write about the South is with this critical love. it's just such an interesting, social observance of to be deeply enmeshed in a place and need to be elsewhere to have of the freedom to be able to observe it with clear eyes. I grew up moving all over the place.
So dad was military. So I don't feel rooted. So to hear someone talk about the way that The earth and a specific of land and the history of your family. And it's really foreign me, but needing to go elsewhere to look back places is very familiar.
[00:24:53] Adia: My dad was in the military as well.
[00:24:55] Michaela: What branch?
[00:24:56] Adia: 101st Airborne up in Clarksville.
[00:24:58] Michaela: Oh, okay. Awesome.
[00:25:00] Adia: Thank God my parents divorced when I was young, so I didn't get the military rad experience. I was just part in Spartanburg, South Carolina. Yeah,
[00:25:09] Michaela: it's, it's a weird way to grow up, but was dragged from town to town for a long time.
So, one of the things you kind on this earlier But read an interview with you where you were talking about really from a young age that knew yourself That you didn't you need society or church or stories of God to affirm you that you felt like you had a really solid relationship within yourself.
And I had written down, you has that been challenged by working in this business that really tries to. Pull people into fitting into a cog in the wheel of the way that you grow an artist's business. mentioned that a little bit with touring, but what has that felt like to start out as someone who felt like they had a really solid sense of who you are and feel that kind of pull?
And what has been like the day to day practices of actually coming back to yourself or, attempting to and what that looks like?
[00:26:05] Adia: I mean, how did it feel? Not great,
[00:26:08] Aaron: Yeah.
[00:26:09] Adia: know, to kind of from being this self oriented person to having, you men telling you what's a good look and what isn't, you're know, and that's tied to your livelihood. That's tied to you, ability to work in in a way. it was really hard.
my sense of style has always been very I dress the way that my body wants to feel. and so it's very particular to me. I never really followed trends. We grew up poor, so I had to learn how to make do with what I had. when I started performing in front of people. Having to start thinking about like, how does this look, is this going to be perceived? And And I think that starting my career the age of social media of, you play a show and people take like super unflattering pictures of you and tag you and you see them. You're just like, Oh, no.
I felt
[00:26:57] Michaela: Yeah, and it's just forever.
[00:27:00] Adia: making, Yeah. Mm hmm. I have not had Instagram on my phone from like six months. Cause I'm just, I can't. the thing though, it's like I don't care what anybody says, I don't care how grounded or like how sure of yourself you are, in this day and age to be a performer or a public facing person, you objectify yourself.
start branding yourself. love the clothes I wear on stage, like I pick them out or have them made for me. But I was touring so much, especially with the Southern Gothic, like everything I was wearing was, black. And then I had like red boots and I was on stage so much that I home and we moved into this home and I realized slowly that like, didn't have any like regular club, civilian mode.
I was like, I don't know how to just. because it was like coming out of COVID too, I'd been in like sweatpants for two years and I was just like, I have completely lost the ability to independently express myself outside of how I'm being perceived. And that was a big red flag for me. I was just like, Oh, no, this isn't good.
I would look at myself in the mirror, not with my own eyes, but like with other people's eyes, you how would someone, about me? And I'm just like, talking to? Yeah. you? hmm.
Like your husband? Like you don't, don't care? And that's when I realized that I had given up so much of my power, so much of my subjectivity, the sake of liked. I was finished with the promotional cycle of Southern Gothic, I mean, still performing like weekend shows here and there, but I told my management, I was like, I don't want any long tours this year. I not trying to be in the van this year. I can't, I have to get to know Adia Paul.
Adia Victoria is my stage name, Adia Paul is me and I, put away all of my performing clothes, all of them. And I'm trying to get back into my sense of style, my sense of do I feel like wearing? Like, my body want to be in today? Like, how do I want to feel in my body and my clothing going to reflect that?
that was another relationship that had been. Damaged by being in this industry. It's not just the people that you leave behind at home, you neglect, or you don't follow up with, or the, text on it, the answers calls go, you whatever ignored, was my relationship with myself to the point where it's like, I even know what to wear unless I'm dressing up for stage.
And so it's been a slow climb back of getting back into my body, trying to talk to myself more, getting back into journaling, because I, stopped journaling, you I have nothing to say to you anymore. And, yeah, like I said, at the beginning of this conversation, it was so slow. That losing your sense of self one day you look up and you can't even dress yourself.
[00:29:33] Aaron: Yeah, I mean, not being a front person married to one and with a ton as a producer and all of that, especially having conversations on this podcast, in a way it's almost like, mask, like Jim Carrey, where there's like the mask and then there's Jim Carrey and they slowly just intertwine and you can't take the mask off and there's no
[00:29:51] Adia: Yep.
[00:29:51] Aaron: line it's all of a sudden like, Oh, I crossed that line.
Here I am. I'm this person. It's just such a fluid thing.
[00:29:58] Michaela: especially if you said you, perform with first and middle name, right?
that's what I do as well, I still feel like, you music so personal. And then my social media, my have to stop myself from sharing because causes me so much anxiety because I'm like, I want to just share my life.
And then I'm like, wait. that smart? And also, then it does blur the line in my head of value system, like judging my life and really messed up and it's exhausting to try and keep boundaries. If you're, if you're someone who's just https: otter. ai sharer and wants to, but then you're like, Oh wait, but this is also my business and my music is me, but it's also my business.
And this is really confusing.
[00:30:45] Adia: Mm hmm.
[00:30:46] Michaela: because there's so much judgment on it too, of like, is myself quantified by my Instagram followers or my streaming numbers no, it's not. But if I am my music, how is it not trying to draw all of those lines and trying to be back in touch with who you are When nobody's looking
[00:31:07] Adia: Yeah, those, those blurred lines.
[00:31:09] Michaela: Yeah feel like also there is like a sense of back to what you said about like media people posting the most unflattering photos of you, I feel like in some ways being a public person has like increased my vanity as well as like just destroyed it because there's so many horrible pictures like, I'm like sweet fan in Knoxville used to make like beer box hats and would come and be like, can you put on my beer box hat? And I was like, sure.
[00:31:37] Adia: know him!
[00:31:40] Michaela: But I also was wearing this like polyester shirt. just one bead of sweat would just spread. So like the picture is like of me with a beer box hat and just like huge armpit stains. And I'm like, cool, that's on the internet forever.
[00:31:54] Adia: So
[00:31:57] Michaela: positive is that you're just like, can't care too much about what I look
[00:32:01] Adia: like. that's the thing too, it's like, situations like that, it's like, is so important to have a sense of humor. I've had to realized that it's like, really can't take any of this too seriously. Yes. Yeah. not to say like everything's like a big joke, but it's just like, all kind of absurd. Yeah. It is.
is kind funny, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah.
[00:32:23] Michaela: Yes. It may, I feel like it like ping pongs where you're just like, no, this is my life's work. This is my livelihood. This so much weight on this. And then you're just like, wait, just making music. We're not saving lives. We're like, I don't want to diminish the value and the importance of art.
But I mean, what we have devoted our lives to, but again, yeah, that feeling of just like, is not a big deal.
[00:32:45] Adia: Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. I That's, you blurred lines, like where does the office end and where does home begin when, you pouring everything out of your life into the music. And now there's this demented way of social media where people can quantify how good you are based on likes and follows.
And, I felt like I reached a point where I wasn't sharing my life anymore. I was sharing very curated, you self conscious clips of what I wanted my life to be. And I realized I was like, Oh my God, my life has become a commercial. I'm living a commercial of, of life.
And something about that just broke me. it also comes from this, like insecurity of like, I'm not sharing, then people are going to forget about me, nobody shares on Instagram for the thrill of sharing on Instagram, like one really enjoys just Hey, you know, it's like, doing this for affirmation, you're doing it for validation.
it just, it to the point where it's just like it's a drug. I It's a drug. And then you realize like, can't even remember why you're doing it. Like just that you need to post, you need to share something. And it's kind at the wisdom of some of my favorite artists, like Fiona Apple.
It's like, don't know what the fuck Fiona Apple does. don't know what her yogurt bowl looks like. I don't know what she looks like going to yoga, do know that once every decade, she's going to drop a record that's going to change my life. And then that bitch disappears.
able to do that because she trusts her audience. She trusts them and respects them enough that she doesn't need to keep like popping up like herpes every two minutes like, and tweets and stuff. She's like, to the music. I'm going to go live my life so I can make more music when I'm ready, I can release it, you the relationship and the boundaries that I'm trying to set with. My audience and with myself. It's like a deal.
Give him the record. You play your little shows and then go away go away. Like you live your life let them live their life, too Like, parasocial relationship thing It's like I don't want to get people accustomed to consuming me like that casually,
you
[00:34:34] Michaela: Okay, but this is my pushback on this because I've, Fiona Apple as an example in my mind as well, but then my argument back, cause I have constant flipping arguments in my head all the time is well, but she can do that because she had a massive hit record in the nineties.
[00:34:51] Aaron: So that's what was going through my
[00:34:52] Michaela: head the whole time.
Yeah, so i'm like could she do that now If she wasn't a trust fund kid how would she live
[00:34:59] Aaron: so my my to him. I'm not a fan of his music, but sturgill simpson does that now? He's not on instagram or anything like that came to prominence After people stopped buying records.
[00:35:10] Michaela: He probably has made enough money. He
[00:35:13] Aaron: has but like don't remember when he was on social media. I never followed him. Oh yeah. So maybe he was like big on social media for a moment,
but, you know,
[00:35:20] Adia: pretty prolific for a while.
[00:35:21] Aaron: okay, see, there you go. There it is.
[00:35:24] Adia: way that I do it is.
I have a day job and it's good for me to have something outside of music that I do
love that I'm able to lean into and, you know, and it helps me pay the bills and it helps me, you I'm not touring or.
Promoting myself that. way, then I still have another, job to do. can't recommend that for everybody or other artists. that's kind of like the deal that I had to make. I'm just like, all I have to do this to keep my sanity.
[00:35:51] Aaron: amazing. feel like that's such a taboo thing to talk about. Um, because people, I was going to say,
[00:35:56] Michaela: thank you for sharing that. Yeah,
[00:35:58] Aaron: again, I think it's the social media thing where, have this front and it's like, no, I'm this, famous artists, so successful, I'm making money.
I, like this, switch of like, you're not, Only doing this for a living, then you're not a real artist. And, you read this book, artists don't starve or something like that. And it basically was like the whole book just questioned the stereotype of like starving artist.
an okay book, but the one thing that was a big takeaway is that all artists throughout history have had benefactors.
And. You Sometimes that benefactor is day job. And if it allows you the headspace to create the art that you want to create.
the most purest sense than yes, do that.
[00:36:34] Michaela: Yeah.
[00:36:36] Adia: Yeah. I mean, if for all we know, Fiona Apple could have a day job who, fucking knows, Right. She might be
[00:36:40] Aaron: slinging
frappuccinos. I don't know.
[00:36:43] Adia: don't know that's her business, you Yeah
the pandemic, I worked at Amazon warehouse, all of 2020 and most of 2021. And I was upfront about that with my followers.
Like I was yeah, I'm working at a warehouse right now. Like gotta eat. And also I like having. Another job. I like being able to do other things other than entertain you people people are like, oh, so brave I'm just like you guys know that you're not my entire life, right? Like you're not my whole life
[00:37:12] Michaela: But, or there's also the, sentiment of like, Oh man, I'm so sorry that you have to do that, why I like to normalize like, always worked, I've always taught music lessons and songwriting coaching and vocal technique coaching, and I've, never been able to exist off of just my record sales, streaming, sounds so stressful to have that be my only thing and this idea that you're not successful unless you can say, I make all my money from this, is for me.
I know some people mean that with really good intentions, but, people always say that like the want to keep your friends, don't talk about like money, politics and religion. And I feel like my whole life is like, can't we talk about all of the things that nobody wants to talk about?
Because these are the most important things. And financially, like I want to know everybody's. Spreadsheets and like, to know how everybody does it because I learned like the more you dig and the more people are honest, finances of this business are hard many, many levels. And it sets people up to feel like they're a failure based on their Money situation and income and meanwhile somebody who even is selling out 500, 000 person rooms sometimes is not coming home with a profit.
[00:38:31] Adia: that's the thing too of feeling like you're not a success if XYZ a success to who? Who's defining success by who's measuring stick are we using to measure ourselves? You me, like success is, can I look in the mirror and recognize myself? Do I like who I am at the end of the day?
Am I someone that I would want to be friends with? I able to love still seek joy for joy's sake? success to me because I've seen too many wealthy people in this business, you peers and that we've looked up to the most miserable motherfuckers like ever come across outwardly, they look like they have it all.
But if you don't have anything internally, that's guiding you and it's all just about hitting the marks, you know, all of these supposed to, you supposed to do this. I did. I'm supposed to do that. It's that becomes a prison. Like very quickly.
[00:39:18] Aaron: Yeah.
[00:39:21] Adia: Yeah, you're shooting the bed.
[00:39:22] Michaela: Yeah, we were just talking with another interview about on your path and thinking of all the things that you're supposed to achieve. And then, you don't get them, or you do get them, and then, I've had so many moments of being like, wait, I even want these things? Or are they just what I thought, okay, this is where I fit in, so this is what I see people celebrating and getting, so that's what I should get.
And as military kid who's moved a lot like, I've done that a million times over and, met in jazz school in New York City and was in a jazz school and I knew I wasn't a jazz singer, but it was like where I ended up and then I'm like, of a sudden being like, yeah, I got to play at Dizzy's.
I'm like, do I want to play at Dizzy's? And then I moved to Nashville and I'm like, oh yeah, I got to play at Newport. And I'm like. I want to play at Newport.
Like, it's just like where, fall and what you see around yourself. And it takes a lot of intentional work to be like, wait, what are my marks?
What playing the Grand Ole Opry? Like, that actually align with like everything in my soul that tells me, yes, this is what I want, something I want to do. Or is that, that something that's seen around me as an accomplishment. this takes a lot of energy and a lot of mental and emotional work
[00:40:36] Aaron: to make.
It takes a lot of space to check in honestly with yourself on where you're at and what's, what's happening and what's working and being willing to change. applaud you, Adia, for like, Whoa, on right here is not working for me. And I need to this parachute and change and not an easy thing to do.
And that takes like guts and some strength. So I just want to applaud you doing that.
[00:40:59] Adia: Thank you guys. Appreciate that. Yeah, it's not easy, but necessary.
[00:41:03] Michaela: Yeah. And I think in the big picture, something to remember is if your goal in life is to feel in touch with yourself and create. Art, because creating is what feels natural and necessary for you and you want to create art that's meaningful. Doing all those things, if that means you make three records over your whole lifetime, they're going to be three better records than if you made 20 because you feel the pressure to stay relevant and make a record every year and appease the algorithms and the labels and the managers and all that stuff.
but that again is a hard thing because you want to keep being able to do this. And we're, taught that way to sustain is to keep growing numbers and attraction and staying, you appealing.
like you said, some of my favorite artists like, don't follow any of them on social media. don't know what they're doing.
I just know I love record.
[00:41:58] Adia: There it is. Yeah.
This is a really cool podcast you guys. really cool. Yeah.
[00:42:03] Aaron: appreciate you out time in your day to sit with us.
[00:42:06] Michaela: I have one last question. Get there. One think you and I have only met a couple of times. It usually is at a festival and me coming up to you and being like, Hi, I'm Mikayla and I'm fan and followed you on Twitter a while and very outspoken about injustice and social justice and racism background. I got a degree in sociology and American history, specifically on social movements the inner section of, of music with social And for people that I see whose art, is commentary on really important issues in the world that are also deeply personal.
the consequences of, you of the things that come with that, especially in the age of social media, of what backlash, the response, all emotional care that I would think that it takes, curious about that aspect and if that's something that you about, that you have to think about because it's part of your life.
Um, it's not a question because you're like, this is who I am and this other way for me to be. Mm
[00:43:08] Adia: What you see me give publicly is what I've okayed myself to give. at a level that does not Deplete me psychologically, spiritually, emotionally. And it's not really hard to do what I do. Like my mom is a community organizer, which she does is hard. She's at the courthouse. Monday through Friday, helping people not get evicted, she's doing the hard work and I constantly have to like, her back in.
I try and pamper her and take care of her. And so I'm not going to pat myself in the back too much. At all. Really? treat the public like having a conversation with people. I'm at a party and I'm not going to sit at a party and be like, no, don't talk about sex politics or religion. It's like, well, does that lead to talk about And it's the things that have been deemed most taboo are the things that are the most common amongst us and I'm not going to just speak commonly and plainly then what am I even talking about?
You blues is, social commentary. The blues is a school of thought, a radical school of thought of, black southerners and. I have it easy as far as a lot of my favorite blues performers did. A lot of the blues women that created records that sustained me. And it's like, if they could tell the truth, one chain away from slavery, one generation removed from slavery.
I can get on Twitter and, crack jokes about, you white nonsense. Mm hmm. You know, it's no sweat off my back, but it's I have no true hope for this country. It's like, I'm not putting all my eggs in the basket of like look, I have to find peace and joy.
Joy is my justice. And America's going to do as America does, and as America always has, and I'm not hanging hat on America and lightning and at itself one day like America's bullshit you still have to find joy amongst the bullshit. that's it.
[00:44:45] Michaela: That's a
beautiful quote. find joy the bullshit.
[00:44:49] Adia: not trying to be a leader. I'm not trying to be. Anybody's hero. I'm, just a clown with a microphone. Yeah.
[00:44:58] Michaela: Well, I think
that's a great, great place to close. Man, thank you so much for this conversation and for your honesty and uh, generosity. Yeah.
[00:45:08] Adia: Absolutely. Yeah.
We'll have to have you guys up to the cabin one of these days.
[00:45:11] Michaela: my God. I'd love that. Yeah. If don't mind us bringing a wild little two year old.
[00:45:15] Adia: No, we can set her loose in the forest.
[00:45:18] Aaron: Yes. She would love it. Yeah, absolutely.
this is, really great conversation. Thank you.
[00:45:24] Adia: Thanks for having me y'all.