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Q&A: Trixie Mattel On Her Debut Album '2 Birds'

The year is 2017, and a country/folk musician in big pilus and tons of make-up hit #ii 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 cosmos Trixie Mattel the record is her musical debut. With a traditional sound, intelligent lyrics, and irresistable hooks, Two Birds has become an instant success.

The Typewriter defenseless upward with Brian/Trixie to talk about songwriting, being topped by Chris Pratt, and a possible follow-upward to Ii Birds.

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

A movie everyone should watch: Clueless

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

An creative person everyone should see live: me, Trixie Mattel

A severely underrated song: "A Case Of You" by Joni Mitchell

A severely overrated vocal: oh my god, how much time do you have? — for instance "Hey Ya!" past Outkast

Sing along, heed, turn off:

a) Dolly Parton, Kacey Musgraves, Miranda Lambert: sing forth to Dolly Parton, definitely listen to Kacey Musgraves, and don't care most Miranda Lambert that much

b) Alaska, Miss Fame, Courtney Act: sing forth to Alaska, heed to Courtney — you never turn off Courtney, and don't even turn on Miss Fame

What did you pursue starting time in your life, music or elevate?

Music came mode before elevate. I only started elevate when I was about nineteen, music I started when I was about xiii. I grew up in the country where we played music at home a lot.

Well-nigh people know you from RuPaul's Elevate Race. Why didn't yous release your music when your flavor was airing, as other queens do? Why did yout wait until at present?

Information technology didn't really make sense to me to perform music in elevate because I didn't think Trixie Mattel was a singer. I thought information technology was more a one-act matter. Merely then I constitute that the more I incorporated my existent self into my drag the more people liked it. And so when I started my stand up testify Ages 3 And Up I put an original vocal in the middle, and every night it was everyone's favourite part. It occured to me that I was sitting on something at that place. It didn't make sense to put the two together until I did. I don't know if I should have done it sooner.

Also, releasing music when your season ends, I feel like that'south an action people take who are not musicians. The only reason they have something to sell is because they are opportunists. Yous shouldn't release music considering you're cross-dressing on boob tube. Yous should release it when it feels right.

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

I don't really like electropop. I don't really like club music or hip-hop. I just actually feel land and folk music. So I thought if I incorporated it in a very sincere way that nevertheless had a sense of humour to it people could go along with it. And they did, luckily.

Unremarkably people either release full length albums with at least nine tracks or EPs with a maximum of 5. Your record, Two Birds, has six tracks. Why did you chose that format?

I wrote about twelve pieces of music for the anthology. Only what I learned from doing my YouTube serial [UNHhhh] is that people similar brusque things. They don't know information technology, but they do. I similar short things, likewise. If I meet an album that has fifteen songs, I probably won't listen to all fifteen of them.

I wanted 2 Birds to be a vocal wheel, meaning you listen to the songs in the right order and it chronologically makes sense. I wanted to selection the songs that fabricated sense together and told a story in a very concise way.

It was all my ain fiscal investment, too. So I thought allow's do something pocket-size and short and see if people respond to it. You lot tin can always make 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 record and release. You should ever exit the listener interested in what you'll practise next. If Two Birds does well my plan is to do another small batch of songs that's similar a companion piece.

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

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

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

Too, I'yard very inspired by people like Johnny Greenbacks and June Carter. I honey the imagery of a human and a woman together making a duet album and I wanted that with merely me.

Is that where the title Two Birds comes from?

Yep, it refers to several things. It's ii birds considering it'due south Trixie and Brian. Also, it has to practice with people coming and going. If you imagine an electric wire and two birds sitting on it, they just stay for a certain amount of time before one leaves. The time that they're together, that'southward the story of this album.

I wrote the album on a Hummingbird guitar and a Dove guitar, and so that'southward 2 birds. Also, my grandpa taught me to play guitar on a Hummingbird, and my grandma's spirit fauna is an owl, and so that'due south also a two-birds-thing. It has a few meanings to information technology.

Ii Birds hit #2 on the United states of america iTunes charts behind the Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 2 soundtrack. Did yous expect it to exist this successful?

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

I hateful, that'south crazy. I was just hoping to make my financial investment back. I used all my own money. I wrote all the music; played information technology, sang it, shot the art, conceived information technology all myself. So for it to go to a higher place and beyond the influence of Drag Race fans was a pipage dream that I never thought would happen. Information technology's gonna be on the Billboard charts next calendar week, on the elevation 200 albums.

You lot can't think of Drag Race audiences every bit stupid. They like quality. People like drag queens considering you get a gustatory modality of alive performance, visual fine art, singing, dancing. For each journey you take them on, if you put your eye into it and give them something proficient, and then they'll at least endeavour it. And if they like it, they'll stick around.

What is your songwriting procedure?

The beginning line of the song is ever the first thing I write. I write top to bottom, first to cease, in the right lodge. And I usually do it in i sitting.

"Seen My Human" and "I Know You All Again" were both written in mayhap fifteen minutes. I merely sat down and did it, and it came out exactly every bit I wanted it. For "Mama Don't Make Me Put On The Dress Once more" I was drunk in Provincetown on a cycle with an empty bottle of Fireball in my bicycle basket when the line "bottle in my basket" came to my caput. Then I kind of worked around that.

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

I concur. All my favourite songs I've done came out all at once and the way somebody would actually say it. If y'all overthink it too much, if you micro-manage it, information technology'southward never gonna sound real. You lot have to trust your oral fissure and your brain. I never know what I'm saying until I've said it.

Is at that place anything popular songwriters tend to do that annoys you lot?

I personally try to exist 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 considering that's a little more nuanced to me. When someone says "maybe" and "babe" I'm like… okay.

As well, the use of repetition in pop music sometimes makes it audio similar it was conceived in a science lab. Like information technology was made to make money. That'south very transparent to me.

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

Yeah, folk music is the deepest, most existent kind of music. It's nearly complex issues that will never be solved. But they're being explored by someone in musically quite a simple way. It's impressive because you're really trying to always reinvent the wheel. I gauge what I'm saying is that I similar folk music considering it'due south not very complex only information technology's yet very deep. In that location's a lot to ruminate on fifty-fifty thought information technology's like shooting fish in a barrel to listen to.

The first single and video from Two Birds was "Mama Don't Brand Me Put On The Dress Once again". Exercise yous have plans for more singles and more music videos?

I'm gonna do another single from the album. In that location was 1 song in item that anybody loved and wanted to be the unmarried. I honey that song, too, merely it's kind of sad, and I just idea it would exist a sad first single. So I have the ambition to create another visual story for that vocal now.

I didn't even wanna do a music video at outset [for "Mama Don't Make Me…"]. Only some other drag queen told me, "brand a music video or no 1's gonna buy your album." I'm glad I did because I enjoyed making it and I got to work with Leslie Jordan 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, it's very real and arduous and tiring.

The responses to "I Know You All Over Once more", which may exist the pitiful song you just mentioned, were astonishing. What was the inspiration for that one in particular?

I was recently getting over a past relationship. And I was working in the town that the gentleman was from. You know, when yous become some place that reminds you very much of a failed relationship yous think you're over, you larn very quickly that y'all're not as over information technology as you think you are. The vocal is all about the picayune details of life that make the whole relationship come correct back to you. I wrote it in a hotel room in Kentucky in fifteen minutes.

When and where can people hear the Two Birds songs alive?

They can hear them sung live this month in New York City at the Laurie Beechman Theater. I'1000 doing an album release show there on 23rd and 25th May. Also, my evidence Ages 3 And Up is touring internationally right now and features some music from the anthology.

Finally, is at that place anything y'all'd like to add together?

Well, the album is available on iTunes, Amazon, Spotify etc. And at New York Drag Con and my New York album release shows concrete copies will be available for the first time. I didn't want to do physical copies considering I didn't recall anyone would buy them. But at present information technology 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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