Oregon Music News

Nine years ago in Los Angeles, multi-instrumentalist/singer Emily Wells became a stepmother. A new triangle was formed by two loving parents and one little boy. Six years later, the parents decided to go their separate ways, as couples often do, and Emily was left with a terrible sadness, because the small family was no more.

That grief became its own wound. And though her life felt once again open, “like stepping out into an expanse” after parenthood’s powerful and ever-present responsibilities, Emily could not shake the sense of loss that was now rooted in her heart.

She went to Topanga Canyon, a small town in the Santa Monica Mountains of western L.A. County, to find solace and to do what musicians do best, which is make music from life experience. Nine months later, she’d written Mama. Mixed in New York and mastered in L.A., Mama is Emily’s third full-length. It is the most “honest and totally explicit” of her albums to date.

“Before Mama, I felt like I was writing in code.”

The lyrics in this fresh, divergent album are clearer than what came before. They are shared “with honesty, no bullshit.” And though Emily is known for her ethereal voice, this time around its quality is more aerial than usual. Perhaps this is because the music is now stripped down and gorgeously blunt, like the landscape of Topanga itself, which is “beautiful and clean” and easily gives way to elements of air and light. Mama is less metaphor, and more visibility. With Mama, Emily embraced a far greater amount of single takes than she had on previous albums, wanting to capture “the feel of musicians playing live.” Samples are most often played on a sample pad, as with the track “Passenger” (see video below), which is a melodic lullaby that loops the delicate yet willful refrain, “I’m a passenger. I’m a passenger. Give me the keys I want to drive.”

Above all, Mama is an album that reflects the reality of both the nurturing process and the need for space; the type of dualism inherent in taking on any relationship while still trying to hold onto one’s separate self. But if Mama is strung together with a sympathetic material, Emily’s accompanying EP Stepmom turns toward a sharper corner of the story, lingers in the charged emotion and unsettled grief of finding one’s way among family, partnering, motherhood, love. Stepmom emits a physical intensity unlike Mama, though the two are not so thematically removed from each other in the end. Mama releases April 10th, with Stepmom following later in the year.

Releasing two new albums in 2012 is a feat for any musician, but Emily is nothing if not busting at the seams with creative energy. Needless to say, she didn’t stop at releasing two. Together with Japanese-American hip hop producer Dan the Automator (Crudo), she formed a passion project called Pillow Fight. She is the lyricist/singer and Dan the Automator is the music man extraordinaire. Their self-titled full length will drop soon so stay tuned, because Pillow Fight’s music is a crowd stopper. Guests on the album include Kid Koala and Lateef the Truthseaker (Latyrx, The Maroons, Quannum Projects). Both Pillow Fight and Emily Wells are scheduled to play SXSW 2012.

Emily Wells plays the Doug Fir Lounge this Thursday night with special guest Timmy Straw opening. Doors at 8pm. Show at 9pm. $10. 21+