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