I Know You All Over Again Brian Furkis

Q&A: Trixie Mattel On Her Debut Album 'Two Birds'

The year is 2017, and a country/folk musician in big hair and tons of brand-upwards hit #2 on the US iTunes charts.

For Brian Firkus the mini album Two Birds is the follow-up to his 2009 EP Greener. For Brian's drag creation Trixie Mattel the tape is her musical debut. With a traditional sound, intelligent lyrics, and irresistable hooks, Two Birds has become an instant success.

The Typewriter caught up with Brian/Trixie to talk almost songwriting, being topped by Chris Pratt, and a possible follow-up to 2 Birds.

An album everyone should listen to: The Consummate Trio Drove by Dolly Parton, Emmylou Harris, Londa Ronstadt

A movie everyone should watch: Clueless

A identify everyone should visit: Dollywood (Dolly Parton's theme park in Tennessee)

An artist everyone should see live: me, Trixie Mattel

A severely underrated song: "A Example Of You" past Joni Mitchell

A severely overrated song: oh my god, how much time do you take? — for instance "Hey Ya!" by Outkast

Sing along, heed, plow off:

a) Dolly Parton, Kacey Musgraves, Miranda Lambert: sing along to Dolly Parton, definitely mind to Kacey Musgraves, and don't care about Miranda Lambert that much

b) Alaska, Miss Fame, Courtney Human activity: sing forth to Alaska, listen to Courtney — y'all never plough off Courtney, and don't even plough on Miss Fame

What did you pursue offset in your life, music or drag?

Music came way earlier drag. I just started elevate when I was about nineteen, music I started when I was about thirteen. I grew up in the country where we played music at home a lot.

Most people know you lot from RuPaul's Drag Race. Why didn't y'all release your music when your season was airing, as other queens do? Why did yout await until now?

It didn't really make sense to me to perform music in drag considering I didn't think Trixie Mattel was a vocalist. I thought it was more than a comedy thing. Simply and then I institute that the more than I incorporated my existent self into my elevate the more people liked information technology. And and then when I started my stand up up show Ages three And Upwards I put an original song in the eye, and every nighttime it was everyone'due south favourite part. Information technology occured to me that I was sitting on something there. Information technology didn't make sense to put the two together until I did. I don't know if I should have done information technology sooner.

Likewise, releasing music when your season ends, I feel like that's an action people have who are non musicians. The only reason they have something to sell is because they are opportunists. You lot shouldn't release music because you're cross-dressing on goggle box. You should release information technology when information technology feels right.

Why did you choose a traditional folk/country sound for your debut?

I don't really similar electropop. I don't really similar order music or hip-hop. I simply really feel country and folk music. So I thought if I incorporated it in a very sincere way that still had a sense of humor to it people could keep with information technology. And they did, luckily.

Normally people either release total length albums with at to the lowest degree nine tracks or EPs with a maximum of 5. Your tape, Ii Birds, has six tracks. Why did you chose that format?

I wrote about twelve pieces of music for the album. Simply what I learned from doing my YouTube series [UNHhhh] is that people like short things. They don't know information technology, merely they do. I like short things, too. If I see an album that has 15 songs, I probably won't listen to all fifteen of them.

I wanted Two Birds to be a song cycle, meaning y'all listen to the songs in the right order and it chronologically makes sense. I wanted to option the songs that made sense together and told a story in a very concise way.

It was all my own fiscal investment, also. So I idea let'southward practice something small and short and see if people answer to information technology. Y'all tin always brand more. I can always write more music. In fact, I still have tons of songs I didn't use on the album that I could tape and release. You should e'er go out the listener interested in what you'll do adjacent. If Two Birds does well my programme is to practise another modest batch of songs that's like a companion piece.

You lot released the record under the Trixie Mattel name. The visuals that accompany it feature you equally both Trixie and Brian. Was it always going to be this mode?

Originally I was gonna do it as Brian. And then I thought it was a poor business choice to non loop in the audience that I accept in drag. And then we shot the album art in drag, out of elevate, and together. Then nosotros decided from there.

I thought it'south the audience of Trixie Mattel who's gonna exist listening, and the anthology tells the story of the human behind the curtain, like in The Wizard Of OZ. It's the life experiences of someone who travels as Trixie Mattel. Someone who travels the earth alone and navigates relationships while working a lot. Who the audition imagine singing when they listen is pretty irrelevant.

Also, I'm very inspired by people like Johnny Cash and June Carter. I love the imagery of a human being and a woman together making a duet album and I wanted that with but me.

Is that where the championship Two Birds comes from?

Yeah, it refers to several things. Information technology's two birds because it'due south Trixie and Brian. Besides, it has to do with people coming and going. If you imagine an electric wire and two birds sitting on it, they only stay for a certain amount of fourth dimension before one leaves. The time that they're together, that'south the story of this album.

I wrote the album on a Hummingbird guitar and a Dove guitar, so that'due south ii birds. Also, my grandpa taught me to play guitar on a Hummingbird, and my grandma'southward spirit creature is an owl, and so that's also a ii-birds-thing. It has a few meanings to it.

Two Birds hitting #2 on the United states iTunes charts backside the Guardians Of The Milky way Vol. 2 soundtrack. Did you expect information technology to be this successful?

Well, I was hoping Chris Pratt would top me, merely I didn't know it would happen similar this.

I mean, that'due south crazy. I was merely hoping to make my financial investment back. I used all my ain money. I wrote all the music; played information technology, sang information technology, shot the fine art, conceived it all myself. Then for it to go in a higher place and beyond the influence of Drag Race fans was a pipe dream that I never idea would happen. It's gonna be on the Billboard charts next calendar week, on the acme 200 albums.

You can't think of Drag Race audiences equally stupid. They like quality. People like drag queens because you go a gustatory modality of live operation, visual art, singing, dancing. For each journeying you take them on, if you put your heart into it and give them something expert, so they'll at least endeavour it. And if they like it, they'll stick around.

What is your songwriting process?

The beginning line of the song is always the starting time thing I write. I write top to lesser, beginning to terminate, in the correct order. And I usually practise it in ane sitting.

"Seen My Man" and "I Know You lot All Over Again" were both written in mayhap 15 minutes. I just sat down and did it, and it came out exactly every bit I wanted it. For "Mama Don't Brand Me Put On The Wearing apparel Again" I was drunk in Provincetown on a bicycle with an empty bottle of Fireball in my wheel basket when the line "bottle in my basket" came to my caput. Then I kind of worked around that.

Ofttimes the songs that take the least amount of time to write turn out to be the best songs, don't they?

I agree. All my favourite songs I've washed came out all at one time and the way somebody would really say information technology. If you lot overthink it too much, if yous micro-manage it, it'south never gonna sound real. You have to trust your mouth and your encephalon. I never know what I'm saying until I've said it.

Is there anything popular songwriters tend to do that annoys you?

I personally try to be somewhat creative with my rhyming. Sometimes they're not fifty-fifty full rhymes, they're half rhymes. I'm very interested in alliteration and internal rhymes because that'due south a little more nuanced to me. When someone says "perchance" and "babe" I'm like… okay.

Likewise, the employ of repetition in pop music sometimes makes information technology audio like it was conceived in a science lab. Like it was made to brand money. That's very transparent to me.

Country and folk in full general are storytelling genres, whereas pop is more nearly universal phrases, isn't it?

Aye, folk music is the deepest, most real kind of music. It'south about complex issues that volition never be solved. But they're being explored by someone in musically quite a simple way. Information technology'due south impressive considering you're actually trying to ever reinvent the wheel. I judge what I'm saying is that I similar folk music because it'south non very circuitous but it'due south still very deep. There's a lot to ruminate on fifty-fifty idea it's easy to listen to.

The starting time single and video from Two Birds was "Mama Don't Brand Me Put On The Dress Over again". Do yous take plans for more singles and more music videos?

I'chiliad gonna do another single from the album. There was one song in particular that everyone loved and wanted to be the single. I love that song, as well, but it's kind of distressing, and I but thought it would exist a sad first single. So I take the ambition to create another visual story for that vocal now.

I didn't fifty-fifty wanna do a music video at first [for "Mama Don't Make Me…"]. But another elevate queen told me, "make a music video or no 1'south gonna buy your album." I'm glad I did because I enjoyed making it and I got to piece of work with Leslie Jordan over again. The video came out exactly as I wanted. A puppet show being put on for adult cowboys as a metaphor for a drag queen in a gay bar, information technology's very real and arduous and tiring.

The responses to "I Know You All Over Once more", which may be the sorry song you simply mentioned, were amazing. What was the inspiration for that i in particular?

I was recently getting over a past human relationship. And I was working in the town that the gentleman was from. You know, when you go some place that reminds you very much of a failed relationship you recollect you're over, you learn very quickly that you're non every bit over information technology every bit you recall you lot are. The song is all near the fiddling details of life that brand the whole human relationship come right dorsum to yous. I wrote it in a hotel room in Kentucky in fifteen minutes.

When and where tin can people hear the Two Birds songs live?

They tin can hear them sung live this month in New York Urban center at the Laurie Beechman Theater. I'yard doing an album release show there on 23rd and 25th May. Also, my show Ages three And Up is touring internationally correct now and features some music from the album.

Finally, is there annihilation you'd like to add together?

Well, the anthology is bachelor on iTunes, Amazon, Spotify etc. And at New York Elevate Con and my New York anthology release shows physical copies volition be bachelor for the first time. I didn't want to do concrete copies because I didn't call up anyone would purchase them. But now it seems they will.

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Source: https://medium.com/artmagazine/q-a-trixie-mattel-on-her-debut-album-two-birds-c1ae15b1f84c

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