A Conversation With Emily Silver

D: Thank you so much for coming today and setting aside some of your time to do this interview! Let me just say first that I absolutely love your music, I found out about you from seeing the Glue line up. I listen to your two songs on Spotify on my way to lectures all the time!

D: Now I have just a few questions about your general connection with music:

D: Since when were you creating your own music? Has it always been a big part of your life?

E: Yeah probably, I was definitely creating, like writing music towards the end of primary school, I was actually in a band at primary school. It was so cheesy like, we wrote this school creed, it was awful.

D: Did you sing?

E: I didn’t sing, I played piano but I think in my own time secretly at home, I wrote little songs. But I was quite shy about it, so I didn't really show anyone.

D: So you’ve been writing songs for quite awhile then?

E: Yeah probably, like I used to make music with my best friend, from year 7 until the end of school we kind of made music together. I also wrote songs by myself but I guess never full proper songs, it was just more like tunes and stuff.

D: Since you mentioned your friend - would you say music is a big way you bond with other people?

E: Yeah I would say so, I think the process of creating music with people is just fun. I spent a year doing art before I came here and I made a band there through people, me singing and not singing, then like drums and guitar. We used to mess around and make music together. That definitely was a great way to bond with them.

D: Even if it’s not serious, it must have been really fun!

E: Yeah exactly, we never performed anywhere, it was just making music together which was fun.

D: What kind of music did you grow up with? Who or what were your strong musical influences? (whether these are people you know or artists you look up to)

E: My parents definitely are big fans of music, and I definitely agree with their taste - I know it’s kind of weird. But I like some of the things they’ve played before, they obviously showed me some music. And my dad actually writes quite a lot of his own music too, even though that's not his job, just his hobby.

D: Oh really, does he still?

E: Yeah! So that definitely inspired me to (…) My brother is also quite creative and musical, I also jam with him sometimes which is nice.

E: I remember the first album I really liked, it was in primary school, it was Queen’s Greatest Hits and Lana Del Rey.

D: At primary school?!

E: Yeah it’s so inappropriate! … My mum used to play it in the car!

D: Your parents knew Lana Del Rey?!

E: I think it was kind of through me, because my friends liked her, so I liked her, then my parents liked her… but yeah listening to some of the lyrics, it’s so inappropriate!

E: And then my mum took me to this exhibition in the V&A of David Bowie and his life. I remember my mum taking me there in year 7 or 8, and I became obsessed with David Bowie after that. He’s definitely my biggest influence.

D: The gig at Glue was your first, right? How did you find that experience, and do you think you’ll do more in the future?

E: Well I really enjoyed it, yeah it honestly wasn’t perfect (…) but me and my friends, I mean this is going a bit off the question but I don’t feel like there’s many women in music in Durham.

D: Yeah! There’s not many mixed bands as well!

E: No, yeah! And even yesterday (at Glue) there was only me and another female act, and everyone else was men. So yeah, me and my friend want to set up some kind of thing to encourage women doing creative things in Durham.

D: That’s so exciting!

E: Just to encourage people to perform and stuff, because it seems very male at the moment. And if you don’t see many women performing, you’re gonna lack confidence to perform yourself.

E: Back to Glue! Glue was really good, I was quite nervous before but I think by the time I was actually at Glue then it was okay, it was just nice being around people in my band and stuff.

D: It’s nice that you had your friends there as well, it must have helped!

E: Yeah exactly, it was a good night!

E: When I performed yesterday (at Turtle Bay) I actually played synth as well. I kind of prefer it in a way. Part of me just wants to be me, but it feels easier to be protected by an instrument.

D: So you’re working with DH1 Records, is there anything you can tell us about your future music: when its gonna be released, what kind of sound we should be expecting… spoilers?

E: Yeah, so I’m recording a few of the tracks for an EP, I think it’s like 5 songs. I’ve got demos for all of the EP tracks, that would basically be what I performed at Glue. We’re recording the single at the moment, I think we wanted to record the whole EP this term but I think everyone is so busy that it probably won’t happen. But I think I’ve had one recording session so far and maybe one more this week, so hopefully the single will be out soon, we’ll see!

D: For your demos and stuff, do you just record your guitar and singing then put it together with Logic, Garageband, or any other production software like that?

E: Well basically, the songs I already have on Spotify now are how I normally do demos, I recorded that myself, I used Garageband on my phone. I think it’s really good, I really like Garageband!

D: Yeah you can do a lot with it!

E: If I ever tried to use proper software, it wouldn’t sound as good. Maybe because it’s not really high quality, it’s better because it slightly obscures it a bit. So yeah, I just use garageband on my phone.

D: Do you record your vocals on your phone as well?

E: Yeah so I found out that Apple headphones are the best to record voices with!

D: Do you make all the parts of the songs yourself?

E: Yeah so I write all the parts, that’s what I gave the band members to play, guitar parts and stuff.

D: Do you think it’ll be different once you record stuff with DH1?

E: Yeah I don’t know because the demos have all the parts already, so it probably won’t be massively different.

D: Will you re-record all the parts?

E: So we basically tried to transfer the Garageband file into the computer but it didn’t work, so we’re going to have to do it fresh. But I think Alex (from DH1 Records) is a good producer so it should be good, and hopefully I won’t stray too far from what I want to do, hopefully it’ll even be better. It’ll be kind of awkward if it’s not!

D: How did you break out of your shell and muster up the courage to work with DH1 and Glue?

E: Before lockdown I was very shy about writing music and stuff, I didn't really show anyone anything I wrote. It was very personal. But during lockdown, I was doing it so much that - I just was seeing what I really could do, it was the first time I properly wrote full songs. I was honestly around my family the whole time so I built the confidence to show my family my music, and they were nice and stuff, and it felt really good to show other people and for them to like it. But I was still too shy to show my friends and anything because I obviously care about their opinion I didn’t want them to be like, “oh thats sh*t” I do trust my family’s opinion, but if they said it was bad it wouldn’t upset me so much because they’re my family. I think also the change of scene from going to Durham (helped), because in Durham I can say I do music, while people who’ve known me for a long time at home don’t necessarily know that about me, so it could be more of my identity. I’ve been recording songs over Christmas and lockdown (because I didn’t go back in term 2) then eventually in April or March, built up the confidence to release it on Spotify and advertise it on my Instagram story. That was probably the biggest, taking that plunge. I think me and my best friend, we’re used to making music where we both have written the songs that we wanted to release on spotify, they were separate songs and we’d both play each other our songs and go like “wow that’s so good”

D: Hyping each other up!

E: Yeah exactly, we hyped each other up and then I released it.

D: Well that’s really nice that you both were able to talk about it together!

E: Yeah exactly!

E: After I released that, it was definitely the biggest stepping stone because then my friends heard it and a lot of people really liked it, so that gave me confidence. It was just like, getting something solid out there, to define myself musically.

D: It’s comforting to know that you also went through a process to get to that point.

E: Yeah exactly, it was a very long process. It took a long time to build up proper confidence.

D: Yeah, I think sharing your own music, especially ones that you write by yourself is a very personal thing.

E: Yeah, and it’s just like, if someone else judges it, it’s very personal, it’s never going to mean as much to them as it does to you. And sharing it kind of takes away the personal aspect from it because it’s not just something for yourself anymore.

D: I just have a few questions about your songs. “I Do Not Yet Know” was your first song out on Spotify, could you tell us a little bit about the process? From writing the lyrics, to song production, and maybe some of your inspirations while composing the song?

E: I think I came up with the chorus first, and I think the drum beat was taken from a jam I had with one of my friends, the triplet kind of thing, yeah I thought it was really cool!

D: I really liked the drums, it was very distinct!

E: Yeah, so I was inspired by that drum beat, I think the chords are quite unusual in that because it uses C major… C minor…, it’s quite chromatic the chords, it’s C B D C#. So I think I had the chorus first, and then I remember I had a verse with some lyrics and I thought the verse wasn’t good enough, so I kept the lyrics and changed the chords. It started with all chords, and the lyrics I kind of just came up with it in conjunction with them. Then I built a bassline on top of that and just laid down a bit of synth and guitar, just kind of experimenting, thinking of what sounds good with it.

D: Yeah it must be a bit hard to explain the process actually, since it could be quite jumpy.

E: Yeah and it’s probably spread out over loads of different days and stuff.

D: Did you have any particular inspirations?

E: Not really sure, I wasn’t really trying to channel anyone in particular, I mean listening back now I think it sounds a bit like Mazzy Star, maybe a bit Cocteau Twins, but I didn’t really write it with that intention.

D: How about for your second song, “Roads Ahead” was the process any different for it?

E: Oh that one actually had more of an inspiration. In that one, the way I produced it was kind of inspired by Cat Power. She has this one song called “Nude As The News”, where the bassline is kind of constant and never really stops, I really liked that. So in the other song “Roads Ahead” the bassline keeps going… which is quite tiring for Lauren (bassist) but yeah, I just feel like it really worked.

D: It’s so amazing that you’ve done all this on your phone! That’s insane!

E: I love Garageband! Honestly, I’m so worried about losing my phone, I should probably invest in iCloud storage!

D: Do you have any plans for the kind of direction you want to go with your music? Do you think you’re still figuring out your sound or you’ve got one you're comfortable with already? Do you plan to experiment more?

E: I think I’m more confident with my sound than I was a year ago. A lot of people describe it as chill, and I guess quite shoegaze-y too, which I’m quite happy with. And I think I want to pursue that at the moment, and then maybe get more experimental in the future. Once I’m secure with what I’m doing now, try more things out.

D: Do you listen to Shoegaze a lot?

E: Not massively, I won’t say I know masses about it, but it just happened to. I just feel like my voice kind of suits that style of music, because I haven’t got a soul voice, or like I haven’t got a voice like Adele. So I feel like naturally, I think that’s the kind of genre my voice suits as well.

D: If you had all the resources: all the time, funds, people to work with, what is something creative or musical you’d wanna try out? Whether that’s learning a new instrument, experimenting with a genre, doing a gig somewhere, making a music video?

E: I was gonna say yeah, probably making a music video!

D: Do you think you’d direct it yourself?

E: Yeah, it would be so fun, because I’m quite into art, because I studied it. I still make art and stuff, so yeah doing a music video would be so fun because you can combine art, music and narrative.

D: Yeah! It adds another different dimension into your songs!

E: I have actually planned a music video for “I Do Not Yet Know”!

D: Maybe you could work with a film society!

E: It would be sick to work with Durham Student Film!

D: Could you give us 1-2 of your favourite songs at the moment?

E: Okay so at the moment, the song “Dream by Al Green”, and the song “Do Nothing” by the Specials, I really like that as well! I mean they’re kind of random ones for a playlist, but it’s hard to choose, I’m very indecisive, which is why my song is called “I Do Not Yet Know”! Me and my band have quite a lot of banter about the name of the song.

D: Do you have one hot take or a guilty pleasure song?

E: Well I’d say my biggest guilty pleasure musically is that I’m a big fan of Michael Jackson.

D: He’s quite a controversial one isn’t he.

E: I know, he’s very controversial. I went through a big Michael Jackson phase, but I don’t really listen to him anymore. That’s another part of me, I don’t stand for anything Michael Jackson has done, for the record.

D: Do you have a dream festival line up?

E: Dead or alive? I don’t know if I would want to see my biggest inspirations, maybe I would. So maybe David Bowie, R.E.M., Talking Heads, would be great. I’m trying to think of what bands would sound really good live. I don’t really know, if I had more time to think about it - maybe seeing someone like Kanye West would be pretty cool too.

D: Last question! What do you have to say to other budding student artists in Durham who wish to share their music? Announcement!

E: Believe in yourself, go to events… Nothing is as big of a deal as you think it is, just have to have faith in yourself, yeah.. don’t give up. As long as you’re getting something out of it. But also, not to put too much pressure on yourself to do things you don’t want to, because your music can just be for yourself, you don’t have to share it, that is also very valid.

D: That’s very nice! And that is also all for this interview, thank you so much Emily for today! It’s been a great pleasure interviewing you for Purple (we will send you a link to the article!) I really hope to be able to see you perform again because I am genuinely a massive fan.

A Link To Emily’s Spotify