
It’s been quite the week with some of my favorite bloggers posting about artists that we work with. Today I want to share with you this fantastic interview with Nadia Ali that Brad from MuuMuse, (one of my daily reads!) posted this week. It’s a great indepth look at Nadia’s most recent Embers and some of the new collaborations she has been working on!
Hi, Nadia! So, I wanted to discuss your album Embers, which was released back in 2009. It was definitely one of my favorite albums of the year. I thought it was truly an accomplishment.
Aww, thank you so much! I really appreciate that.
Of course! It was incredibly crafted. One of my readers wanted to know what your influences were when you were creating the album–what you were listening to, or any records in particular.
It’s interesting that you ask because I was listening to a lot of different things while making this album. I was listening to Radiohead quite a bit. I was listening to–there were definitely some influences. BT, I love. I love a lot of folk singers. I love artists like Ray LaMontagne, Neko Case, Sheryl Crow, so I have a lot of that. It comes through in my songwriting because I am writing more to just a piano and a guitar the first time a song is born–it’s written to those two elements, and then it goes into production. That’s when it gets its wardrobe, its attire. That’s the process.
Was the album produced by the same producer, or were there multiple producers?
There were multiple producers–three main producers. There was a gentleman in Chicago named Fritzy who always wanted to make something for the album. His background is in folk rock, so with him I sort of went through the journey of taking it to a more electronic place. The other two collaborators were Ned Shepard and Sultan, who are based in Montreal. They’re actually DJ/Producer artists, and they come from a very musical background. Their music is generally electronic and synthesized. With them, I basically had them go the more organic musical instrumentation side. The last of the producers was this guy in Sweden, Alex Sayz. He and I actually worked electronically back and forth on three of the songs. Yeah, those of the three main people. There were a few other producers I collaborated with that didn’t make it on the album, but that’s simply because you want to choose the songs that seem to fit with the rest of the album.
It’s surprising that there are three very different producers or sounds because the album definitely sounds cohesive. It sounds like it could have been done by the same producer.
Yeah. The common denominator is my voice and the songwriting, so I guess that’s where the cohesiveness comes. Also, we were playing a lot of these songs back and forth. The producers were aware of what I was looking for. I co-produced the whole album, so that’s where you get that semi-similar sound.
How long was it in the works, as far as writing and recording?
Oh my goodness. (Laughs) It stretched over a course of four years. That’s due to all of the touring, and many drafts of different productions that I had. I had some songs produced four different times until I felt it had the right production in the end. You know, I was still learning who I was as an artist, my identity as a songwriter, co-producer, what I could do vocally. That all contributed to the four years. (Laughs)
Well, it paid off, so don’t worry about it.
Aww, thank you. Thank you.
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