Page 104 of Until You Say Stay
I grab my laptop from the coffee table, pulling up the tracks from the Seattle sessions. “Okay, so these are the demos from this week. They want to see what I sound like with their production style. But I need you to listen and tell me if I’m being crazy or if these are actually as bad as I think.”
“Bad how?” Maren accepts the earbud I hold out.
“Just listen,” I say, hitting play on “Wildfire.”
I watch her face while the song plays. She nods along but I can’t read anything from her expression, which is both comforting and terrifying.
“Well?” I ask when it ends.
“Hmmm. Play me the original.”
I pull up my demo from earlier this year. We listen and the difference is stark. Mine has all this urgency and anger and pain coming through in every note. The new version sounds like it could be anyone singing about anything.
It ends and Maren taps her fingers on her knee, thinking.
“Give it to me straight. Be brutal. I need it,” I say, taking a sip of wine.
Please tell me I’m wrong. Please tell me it sounds amazing and I’m just being difficult and precious about my art or whatever.
She grins. “Well I don’t know about brutal. But I think the new one… okay, it kinda sounds like generic reality TV show music. Like those songs they play that always sound exactly the same. Your original always gave me goosebumps.”
I groan, dropping my head back against the couch. “Ugh, that’s what I was thinking too. Dammit. I was hoping you were going to say it was all in my head and I’m going to be the next big thing.”
She laughs. “Well I still think you’re going to be the next something amazing, but this isn’t it. But then again what do I know about music?”
“Giving yourself an out?”
She nods, sipping her wine. “Yes. Very important that when you give people advice you state you don’t really know what you’re doing so if they follow it and it goes bad, you aren’t responsible.”
I laugh despite everything. “Smart strategy.”
“I learned from the best.” She grabs a chocolate chip cookie. “So what are you thinking?”
“Ugh, I don’t know. I feel like maybe I’m being unrealistic about how the industry works. Like what if this is my only shot, you know? And even if it’s not perfect I throw it away and then lose out on my chances. Maya keeps saying trust the process, that I need to prove I can adapt before they’ll give me creative control. And maybe she’s right? Maybe this is just how it works and I’m being difficult.”
Maren’s brow furrows. “It’s a tough call. I’m not going to lie and say everything will work out perfectly if you follow your gut. Sometimes following your instincts means taking the harder road with no guarantees. But you also have to live with whatever decision you make. If you sign with Tidal and put out music that doesn’t feel like yours, will you be okay with that? I guess that’s the real question.”
I don’t have an answer. I take another bite of cookie to fill the void.
“What does Jack think?” Maren asks.
“I haven’t really talked to him about it in detail. We’ve texted about it a little, but he’s been so busy with the race weekend.”
“Makes sense.” Maren pauses. “I should have brought Calvin over. Get a third opinion.”
“Yes, I’m so torn I need all the perspectives.” I kick my feet up onto the coffee table. “Maybe I should pull up those articles about label deals again. Refresh my memory on what’s actually standard versus what’s a red flag.”
We order pizza and spend the next few hours eating and dissecting every angle. I show Maren some of the industry articles I’d bookmarked months ago when this first started, the ones about contract clauses and creative control timelines. She asks good questions, plays devil’s advocate when I need it. We debate back and forth so much that my brain feels like it might actually explode, so we veer to less stressful topics.
Maren tells me about how her second book is going, and then she gets into the latest project at their Victorian. They’ve been working on the house for the past year and it’s pretty much done, but they both love house projects so they’re always finding another room to improve.
After both of us start fighting yawns, Maren glances at her phone and groans. “Shit, it’s almost eleven. Calvin’s probably wondering if I got kidnapped.”
I nod. “Thanks for spiraling with me tonight.”
“Anytime. That’s what I’m here for.” She stands and stretches. “Call me tomorrow?”
“Absolutely. We’ll see if I actually make a decision about any of this.” I walk her to the door.
