Little did Sabrina Song know that a chance encounter, while sitting on a park bench in New York, would kickstart her upward trajectory.
Sabrina’s debut LP is “burning a hole in my skull” as Afternoon proclaims. Soft like a a warm cozy blanket, sweet like chocolate and begging to be played on repeat, You Could Stay In One Spot, and I’d Love You The Same is a solid release worthy of a listen.
Montreal Rocks spoke to Sabrina ahead of her performance in Montreal at Bar Le Ritz on November 26th, 2024. Articulate and sporting a New York Yankees baseball cap, we get right into it.
Watch below:
Origin Story
Music has always been part of Sabrina’s life. From an early age, she participated in the choir, orchestra and plays while in school.
“Theatre made me realize that I love performing. I loved singing and I didn’t know anyone who was in a band. That just hadn’t even crossed my mind.”
It wasn’t till the second half of high school that Sabrina got into songwriting, but relied heavily on covers at the beginning.
“I would sing covers at the one upscale restaurant in my town and at the farmers’ market. I think it made me a little more comfortable singing music that wasn’t for theater, choir, or whatever I was singing around the house.”
Sabrina sang Sara Bareilles covers, as well as well-worn classics like Fly Me To The Moon to upscale brunch patrons.
“There was a period I was very uncomfortable performing my own music because I had never done it.”
Eventually, Sabrina came full circle with her singing, settling into the same comfort level she had performing in plays.
Music School
Sabrina had an amazing music teacher in High School, Mr. Schaefer, who recommended she should keep a journal and try songwriting.
Combined with his class on recording in Logic, Sabrina applied and was accepted to the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music with less than a handful of original songs.
At first, her focus was on theatre “because that was all I really knew. I just felt like everyone was miles ahead of me and had been thinking about this stuff for years and writing songs since they were 10.”
It took a while for her to realize that her feelings of trepidation were also shared by others, even those who seemed born into the role of songwriter. They were all growing out of childhood and becoming adults.
“I did feel like I was writing myself off little bit and it took me a long time to learn how to not be apologetic about what I was doing or apologetic about the state I was at in my progress.”
Sabrina admits to “creating goalposts that didn’t need to be there at such an early point in what I wanted to do and what I even wanted my sound to be like.”
In retrospect, she wishes she could have showed a little more compassion to her younger self, who was starting from scratch.
Sabrina once said: “I’m a raging perfectionist in a career that has no perfect path, education, guarantees, or rules of any kind.”
Once she realized there were no hard-set rules, she began to produce everything alone at first, “partly because I just hadn’t found anyone collaboratively that I felt like really comfortable with.”
She also realized she would eventually get better at ironing out the kinks to shape her sound to match how she heard it in her head.
Creative Process
Sabrina will start songs from a literary standpoint, starting with the words and then bring the music towards it.
“I tend to come up with the beginnings of songs or whole songs when I’m in a moment where I feel like I have time to think.”
These moments of inspiration she calls “seed ideas” will often appear on the train or on a walk.
“There have been times, like before a day job, that I’m standing outside on the street singing into my phone and giving myself a notation about how the phrasing will be, because I definitely do start with lyrics over writing a progression.”
Later, she can then water those seeds, give the song structure and finish it.
Honesty
Along Sabrina’s musical journey, she had to come to terms with her own honesty, writing about things she cared about, not trying to please other people.
“I really admire artists who have a persona and have a character and write from a place that is larger than life. They’re not trying to be vulnerable and write from personal raw experience.”
That is not the path Sabrina chose. Her writing intention is one of honesty.
“My songwriting is trying to distill my emotions, untangle the feelings and figure out how I can articulate this complicated situation in my lyrics and in my songs. It would be a bit of a crutch to not keep massaging the lyric until it felt like the most honest version because that’s what I’m after.”
Fighting her people pleasing tendency, Sabrina continues.
“A big part of the last few years is standing my ground in my life and in my writing and exploring writing from different parts of myself that I used to compartmentalize.”
The Fruit That Changed Everything
“I was basically sitting in the park in New York and this guy came up to me and my friend and was like: Do you make music?”
Impulsively, Sabrina answered yes. She was then asked what song should be in the social media post.
Given the choice between Doors, and Strawberry…he chose the latter.
“It was crazy to see this reaction to this song that had come out a year ago and was probably one of the quietest in my catalog. It was so validating, when you’re given the platform and people are being shown your music, that the response was so positive.”
The song got noticed and Strawberry opened many doors for Sabrina.
Imposter Feelings
Success is often followed by what is often referred to as Imposter Syndrome.
“When you call it an imposter syndrome, it’s something that’s your fault and something that is very solidified, unchangeable and also something that you’re afflicted with.”
Sabrina wrote an essay about Imposter Syndrome and agreed with what she read, that it should be renamed.
“What if we call it imposter feelings, because it’s actually what the world is projecting onto you to make you feel like you’re not feeling these things in a vacuum necessarily. That was where a lot of my early self-deprecation was coming from around music, because I felt like I needed to be given permission to do something…everyone knew something I didn’t…that I couldn’t possibly get to the level where I would call myself a producer and be able to do these things for myself.”
Sabrina realized that these were just feelings. No one needed to give her permission. As a perfectionist, she had to realize that she could take her time, and time would allow her to get better.
“I have control over how I feel about my skill set and who I am as an artist.”
Being able to observe a feeling, takes away its power. You feel it enter your body but instead of absorbing that feeling, you observe it pass through and eventually out of your body.
We must realize that feelings can change, and like Sabrina, those imposter feelings were left behind with an empowering desire to try something, until it was mastered.
Album: You Could Stay in One Spot, and I’d Love You the Same
Interesting fact: The card game on the album cover is actually a made up game that Sabrina and her partner invented.
The title of the album refers to friends and family moving away to different places after graduation.
Relocating from Long Island to Brooklyn allowed her to be immersed a vibrant musical scene, just out of COVID, but friends and family soon started to relocate.
“My family moved out of New York. It felt like the city was totally different and I was out of the schooling infrastructure that I had lived my whole life.”
Now, she was “staring down the barrel of: What happens now?”
For a long time, Sabrina wrote from a place of sadness and insecurity. Now, sharing a common post-graduation lifestyle change, she explored feelings of gratitude.
“I was just trying to capture what I was feeling, and I was mostly just having a lot of gratitude for the people in my life, even the ones that moved overseas or moved across the country. I just felt lucky to have such great relationships.”
She admits that it’s harder to write from a place of happiness than a place of sadness, so she was challenging herself to evolve as a songwriter.
This led her to unpack certain relationship dynamics.
“It was just excavating my own feelings.”
By then, Sabrina was playing more live shows, which was making her want to incorporate the live instrumentation from her live shows into the recorded music. She was also inspired by her Indie-Rock, Singer-Songwriter community.
“They are the most talented artists I have ever heard. It’s really cool to see them grow.”
Inspired by her musical community, she was ready to let her album project start to take form.
“When I found out I got a grant for the album, I knew it was going to be the longest, biggest undertaking I’ve done by far and I knew I wanted a lot of live instrumentation.”
The time was ripe to bring in a co-producer, just to have a sounding board.
“I felt like I was finally at the point where I was secure enough in my opinions and my creative vision for the project that I wasn’t going to be steamrolled by someone.”
Before and After
The song Before and After explores the space between limbo and heartbreak.
“That was inspired by a book I just finished called Station 11 that was about this post-apocalyptic, post-pandemic world. A disease ravaged the planet so quickly that planes were filled with people ready to take off and never even had the chance to.
Everything changed in one moment and it flashes between pre and post worlds. Obviously, that was the most horrifying version of what we were beginning to experience.
The writing was very beautiful in the way it was described, looking back and wanting to hold onto memories, and circumstances that weren’t there anymore.
It reminded me a lot of breakup circumstances too, where you’re in this new reality and you have to just push forward. You can’t yearn for a past that isn’t there anymore.”
To be able to reflect on the before and after gives one perspective, and it shows the maturity of Sabrina’s writing. Yes, she can write a sad song!
Okay Okay
Okay Okay explores the stress of falling in love.
“There’re so many things that are obviously beautiful about falling in love, but it can be incredibly anxiety-inducing to be willing to put your trust in someone that you often didn’t know a few months ago, and hoping that they feel the same way as you.
I wanted to write a love song that was coming from that place of reassurance. I do feel the same way as you and I do love you. Getting over that hump of trusting each other.”
Happy To Be Here
“Happy To Be Here was the last one written for the album. It’s a true love song to me, out of everything I’ve written, in that it’s like coming out of a period of experiencing bad relationships or love in an unhealthy way andexperiencing a very healthy, loving relationship. Wow…this exists. This is really nice. You can really put your trust and faith in this person, like the way you would with friends. It can be difficult to imagine that when you don’t have it.”
And so, the album finishes on a positive note.
First Instagram Post
Sabrina’s first post was from January 26, 2018.
“I remember every second of that night. I was horrifyingly nervous. That was the first show I did for my original music. I was terrified. I thought it was really cool that it was at the bitter end though.”
Just months into college, Sabrina faced her fears, slayed her dragon and put those songs out there for the world to hear.
Sweet Tarts
We ended our discussion with something Sabrina always has in her bag: Sweet Tarts.
It’s hard to pick a favorite flavor when it’s probably just food coloring giving them a different color, but is Sabrina sweet, sour or a little of both?
“I would say sweet. I’m too afraid to scared to step on other people’s toes to describe myself as someone who is presenting as sour.”
Live in Montreal
Sabrina Song will be performing at Bar Le Ritz on Tuesday, November 26th, 2024 supporting Carol Ades.
Get your tickets here!
Like any artist of Sabrina’s calibre, this will likely be the last time you can catch her in such an intimate venue.
Writer: Randal Wark is a Professional Speaker and MasterMind Facilitator with a passion for live music. You can follow him on Instagram, Twitter and YouTube. His Podcast RockStar Today helps musicians quit their day jobs with out-of-the-box advice from Ted Talk Speakers, Best Selling Authors and other interesting Entrepreneurs and Creatives. He created the Rock Star Today Music Business Jam Session for musicians. Randal is a collector of signed vinyl, cassettes and CDs.
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