For a forthcoming episode of the podcast, we chatted to singer-songwriter Kylie Morgan about her debut single, her (very brief) experience in the UK and more…
How are you dealing with all the craziness?
Oh my gosh, what is happening? We didn’t know what we were signing up for.
It ended up being that for C2C, you were one of the only artists that ended up performing. Did you have any chance to explore or was it just you flew in and out?
I literally flew in and out, but honestly I had the absolute best day and night, we got to explore all day and yes I was one of the only artists that actually got to perform and so when they told me that we had to leave, I was like ‘you know what, I’m super upset right now but it could be worse.’
Yeah, I guess you’ve got to make the best of a bad situation. It was so good to get to see you live at the showcase, because I’d got to hear you very briefly at the CMT Next Women of Country launch, but it was great to hear you do a longer set… I absolutely loved your song ‘I Cuss a Little.’ Is that one we can expect you to release and can you tell us a bit about that track?
First of all I’m so glad you were there and you got to share a few songs. Yes, ‘Cuss a Little’ is definitely on the top of the list of releases, we just released ‘Break Things’ a couple of weeks ago that is the current single, and when it came to release it, I was like ‘cool, when can we release another one.’ I’m very excited to get the music out there, every time I get to release songs I get more excited at getting to put music out there from my catalogue of twelve years of songs. I’m excited to finally have them out in the world for sure.
I can imagine, you’re such a prolific songwriter so you’re writing all the time, it must feel a bit strange that you’ve only got two or three songs out because you’ve already got such a huge catalogue of songs behind you that you almost want them all to be released…
It’s crazy, obviously people in the music industry and especially people who do what you do definitely get and understand what a long process it is in releasing, but the average person is like ‘why don’t you release more songs.’ If it was up to me, I’d be releasing a song a week but the process is just so much longer.
Yeah and also sometimes it will be a struggle to match the right production for the song, has that been the case for you that it’s been a journey to find the right producer for your material?
So when I moved to Nashville I was 19 and before that I actually started coming back and forth from Nashville at 15, so I was very lucky to get to dabble my toes into the music industry in Nashville from very young. When I moved here, I wasn’t in the headspace of creating a record yet I just wanted to write it, so I worked with so many producers and writers, where we would write together and then they would produce a demo that would obviously be similar to what the record would sound like. I was very lucky in that it only took me three years of being here, and I found a guy called Shane MacAnally who pretty much took me under his wing and adopted me, musically.
It must have been amazing but also slightly daunting to have someone like him in your corner?
It was so funny because I’ll never forget the first time that we wrote together and I’d been doing this for so long – I did my first live performance at 12 years old – that I don’t really get nervous anymore, when there’s big things, like before I played the Ryman I was freaking out and got pretty nervous, but when it comes to writing appointments it’s just not what I feel, just excited. I’ll never forget the first time we were supposed to write and my boyfriend and I were having dinner, and I thought I was getting sick, like I feel sick and I’m sweating and he’s like ‘Kylie, you’re nervous.’ I thought ‘oh my gosh, I’ve forgot,’ because I was so nervous obviously. I went into it, got over it and he’s one of the kindest, sweetest human beings and most talented people I know, it was truly a match made in heaven for sure.
Do you think that because you started so young – you know, getting recognition from CMA ‘Who New to Watch’ and you had that spotlight on you from a young age – that that enabled you to be more comfortable when you moved to Nashville? You’d already got that foundation in the industry and been broken in a bit.
Right, I was very lucky enough to grow up with a mom that instilled a matter of ‘when’ and not ‘if’ in me, whatever I decided to do. I have the most supportive family that you could possibly ask for, when it came to when I told my mom when I was twelve years old that I wanted to skip college and become a country music artist, she goes, ‘ok well, let’s do it,’ and we were literally at every karaoke concert, we were at every festival and my dad actually painted my own purple trailer at one point. So, I have the most supportive parents and it was literally just a matter of ‘when’ and not ‘if’ and so I had that foundation and especially going back and forth at a young age, I was able to really figure out who I was as an artist a lot sooner than expected. I definitely think it gave me that sense of confidence that now I just need to find the right people to help me get there.
Definitely, and you certainly found that and the proof is in the music. I first heard ‘Boys Girl’ at CMT – it’s so catchy and it’s such a tune, but it’s also so different in terms of content and I don’t think it’s really a song that’s been sung about. What’s the story behind that song?
Sure, well I love that you complimented my songwriting, I truly feel like I’m a songwriter first, I’ve been doing it for so long and it’s literally one of those things that comes second nature to me to do, especially being on the road I was writing a lot less. There would be times where it would be midnight and I’d be with my manager in our hotel room and I’d be like, ‘Hey Marissa, would you mind if I wrote this song, I have this idea?’ She’d say, ‘it’s midnight,’ and I’d say, ‘yeah, I just need to get it out.’ So I’ve always been that way and then growing up I was honestly just a little bit ahead of where I was at in terms of thinking about my future. All the girls my age were thinking about crushes and weddings and saying they wanted to get married and have babies, and I was like ‘I wanna move to Nashville and be a country music artist.’ So I really related more to boys growing up, I had a group of dudes who were literally my people and I just avoided the drama and I just hung out with them. I actually wrote that song with Shane MacAnally and Ross Copperman, Shane actually had the idea and I was like ‘Shane I’ve wanted to write that song for forever, I just didn’t know who to write it with.’ The opportunity just kind of presented itself and once we wrote it Shane was literally jumping up and down, ‘that’s the first release!’ and so I think it was definitely the universe that needed that song, and I was very happy to be the one to deliver it.
I definitely feel like it’s an anthem for a lot of girls out there because it hasn’t been written about before…
Yes and that’s what I love too, especially songs like that and with ‘Break Things’ and even ‘Cuss a Little,’ I love releasing those autobiographical songs and I feel like a lot of girls haven’t been able to have those songs that they think ‘that’s me’ and I love having a complete soundtrack for girls like that. I’ve been really conscious of that when it comes to writing and the songs that I release for sure.
‘Break Things’ was so stunning as well and again was such an unusual take. Were you always clear that that was going to be the song you released?
I think that it kind of just happened, when I signed my record deal with Universal EMI about six months ago and so when you expand the team, you obviously expand the opinions, which is hard and great at the same time. We actually had a whole another plan to release a whole other song and then they asked me to go back in and record five new songs and I’m so glad that they did because one of them was ‘Break Things.’ All of us in the studio were in total agreement that ‘this is it, this is the song.’ It definitely happened in the right way.
I guess with everything going on right now, what is the plan – are you going to be releasing new singles?
Yeah, I feel like that’s a different thing every day. As of right now, I was very lucky to finish radio tour in the past two months – especially before all this started happening, so I’m very grateful for that. I was able to visit a lot of radio stations around the US and pretty much introduce myself and play all my music. We’re hoping that means we’ll be going to radio either with ‘Break Things’ or maybe another song, hopefully very very soon, which I’m really excited about. Every time I play ‘Break Things,’ I’m like ‘hopefully this will be pumping through your radio speakers very soon because it’s been a hell of a journey and I’m just excited to get out there on radio for sure.’
Your yoga practises must have been very helpful on that long journey, in terms of grounding you and helping cope with this notoriously hard industry, particularly with everything going on right now?
Right, I think that yoga has truly been one of those things, especially as a creator, it’s been one of the most grounding things I could have introduced into my life. I was a gymnast for ten years and so I was always moving with such purpose and I missed that when I moved to Nashville. When I started yoga, I absolutely fell in love with it because like we talked about earlier, the music industry is such a slow process and with yoga it gave me that immediate gratification as a creative that I definitely needed to keep myself sane, and so once I started practising, I knew that I wanted to advance my practise so I became an instructor. Once I started leading classes, I had that immediate gratification of once everyone opened their eyes at the end of class I could tell they had that feeling of peace and relaxation and I was a part of giving them that. It was truly just one of the most confidence boosting things that I could find in my life and so even now today I’m doing a ‘Namaste at Home’ class. With all this craziness, I thought just because everything in life is cancelled, doesn’t mean that mind-body connection has to be. I started this Instagram and Facebook Live class that we’re doing. I’m excited about it.
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Final Few
What was the last song you paid for? The last song I paid for was ‘Break Things’ (laughs).
What record couldn’t you live without if you were stuck on a desert island? I would say the recent Ellie Goulding record, I absolutely love her I think she’s just such a passionate artist.
If you could be a member of any TV family, which one would you choose? I think I would choose ‘Friends,’ they just seem like the best and that they always have something going on, which I love.
Wine or whiskey? Ooh that’s a tough one… can I split it down the middle? (laughs)
Complete the sentence…
Music is… healing.
Country music is… honest.
Kylie Morgan is… silly. (laughs)
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