BLAIR BALDWIN
Interviewed by Sofia & Nicole
October 3, 2020
As part of Latinx Heritage Month we were so excited to get to sit down with the badass, hilarious, Xicana budding rock goddess, Blair Baldwin (she/her).
I guess the SparkNotes version of my life is I grew up with a white dad and a Mexican mother in Texas. I identified for a long time as biracial but in my recent studies of my own lineage, I realized I am multiracial. So now I identify as a multiracial Xicana woman. Xicana means a person of Mexican descent. I love the word and I love using it. Then I went to high school. It wasn’t great. But that is okay. I played soccer for a really long time. I even auditioned for the US junior Olympic team. That is always my fun fact. When people are like “give me a funny fact” that is what I tell them. I quit a couple years later because I loved singing, I loved Celine Dion’s voice. What is this and how do I do it? So then I went to a voice coach and he said he wouldn’t see me unless I went and got my voice checked out because he thought I had nodes. I was just trying to start my singing career and he said you have nodes and I was like “okay…” I went and got it checked out and what I found out was, basically if you have nodes, your vocal folds cannot touch because the node is in the way. But mine do that naturally, nothing is there, they just will not touch. I think my conclusion is that I was born with 50% of the hearing in my left ear so I think as a baby I wanted to feel something and hear myself? So I would make it myself a little bit more resonant in my chest. After that I decided to do musical theater in college and because I wasn’t going to go do Opera and I wasn’t going to go do piano. I didn’t really see another option even though there were other options, I just didn’t know. I went to do musical theater and a lot of school’s wouldn’t take me because they said that I sounded sick. They said “you definitely have issues, you are sick, you are not going to be sustainable. No, you are sick.” And I was like, no I am not sick, that’s rude.
I got into the school of my dreams though, I went to Texas State University with a great faculty. They are very progressive, no one is perfect, but they are working hard to make a more equitable space. They are doing a lot of reformation right now which is cool. I went there, and then I moved to the city right after. I was auditioning, I booked an off-Broadway show right by West 4th, the Comedy Cellar kind of vibe. I was living my dream though. I was going into work, I was going into the show, and I got to sing. But I got very bored very fast. I realized that I was very upset with the way Broadway runs, the shows they produce and how they do it. I was like I can’t just stand here and be a part of this because I just disagree so hard. So I started writing my own music. And that is why I am here. I started doing that a year ago. Now I have released 3 songs that I am really proud of, I released a little vinyl package along with it which was crazy and filmed a couple music videos. That is really the story I guess. I am also gay.
Sofia: Blair I obviously met you so long ago in high school, a long long time ago. I met Blair because we were in show together my freshman year, her senior year, and she really took me under her wing. She made me feel super at home, I will forever love Blair for that.
Blair: Well I really had a spiritual connection. I was like Sofia Staartjes is ME. She is my younger self, I gotta protect her at all costs!!
Sofia: She protected the shit out of me. Anyways for a long time theater seemed like the path you were going on. I know you briefly touched on why you decided to make the transition out of theater and move into the recorded music sphere. What exactly happened? For so long it was like the sky is blue, the grass is green, and Blair is going to Broadway.
Blair: First of all, I technically still have an agent. But I feel as though I am living in this crazy Disney Channel original movie where I was like “I wish Broadway was dead!” and then Corona happened... I am so grateful that I am getting a break because we all have to have one. But who knows, I am hopeful things are going to change within the next year and people are going to start treating actors like actual human beings. We will see. I am not totally done but I am pretty done.
How that happened was my best friend booked Broadway the moment we got to New York. I love her. She is one of the nicest people I have ever met, she is a STAR, THIS GIRL. She definitely fucking deserved it. But what I watched happen was a lack of gratitude and racial equity for actors - the reality of Broadway. I realized, as in all things in life, Broadway was not the promise land. That made me really think about what I actually care about. What do I actually want to do if that is not going to satisfy my art?
I had always been writing but there was a time where I stopped getting to perform for a little bit. I say specifically “getting to perform” because that is what pissed me off so much. It felt like I was sitting around and just waiting for someone to let me perform. I am not going to sit here and wait! So how do I put on a show? Where do I do it? How do I invite people? What do I perform? Let’s get this together. I love producing events and I wish I had more time and space and not coronavirus to do it. But that is how my current path formed and it just kind of took off.
Blair: I started writing in high school but I didn’t really know what I was doing. I was like, I’m just going to try! I did write a couple songs, I don’t remember how I did it, but fun fact my most streamed song is one that I wrote when I was 15. And I don’t know how to handle that… I’m kidding but I think I have learned so much more about what a good song is. If you sit down and put your heart into it, it's going to be good and people are going to connect with it. It just takes a little bit of trust within yourself.
I usually start with chords and work with the guitar, but sometimes I try to switch it up and use the piano. From there, I put the chord progression on a loop and sit with my journal. I always go with my instinct and decide that I can edit later. I tell myself to just write something down even if you think it's cheesy, it's fine. Sometimes I write a song in 5 mins and sometimes it takes a year. Recently I have started learning how to play the bass. I am not very good. There is this songwriter named Holly Knight who wrote ‘Love is a Battlefield’ and ‘The Best’ by Tina Turner. I am obsessed with her, she is actually a really nice human and I just love that, she is real! Anyways she was saying that she uses the bass to write songs which I thought was super interesting, so I am trying that out.
Sofia: How has being in New York influenced your songwriting and your sound? I know you were in the Upper West Side before, a very different vibe from Brooklyn. How has living in both places impacted your process?
Blair: Living alone, I was writing a lot more. Just because no one could hear me. Now that I have a roommate, it’s a little harder. I think there are still a lot of the same themes in my songwriting surrounding this idea of like, once I got to New York I didn’t realize how angry I was at the world. Many of my songs are like “what the fuck is going on” or “I am a strong woman, don’t touch me, don’t mess with me, I am going to win.” That is the vibe. That definitely was born in New York City.
There is something I miss about being in the city because you are no one there. I love being no one. I love being no one and people thinking I am someone. And I am like “I am not but you can think that!” It’s my chain and shaved sides. People just often are like “who is that” and I’m like “I’m nobody, but thats cool.” Brooklyn is way different. But it is also corona so it is hard to tell. I can’t just walk down the street here. I could but it is a lot harder. There is a lot of unwanted attention which I don’t do well with - men just cannot seem to let women walk to the grocery store in peace. So that is probably influencing my writing because I am getting really mad every time I go outside.
Sofia: Have you met or interacted with anyone in New York that has influenced your writing?
Blair: Yes and let me shut my window. Those are my neighbors and they are literally who I am going to talk about. I am obsessed with them, I just don’t want them to know.
Sammy Rae and Will Leet. Sammy Rae and The Friends is her band - they are fucking incredible. I think they came up in my Discover Weekly originally. But then I met Sammy out at someone’s show. We got close super fast and I asked her if she would help me because I was like “I don’t know what I am doing”. So she would sit with me every week, here is what you need to do, this is what I learned, don’t make those mistakes again. Really tedious and helpful work and I would honestly not be where I am at if it weren’t for her. She is my neighbor, she lives downstairs.
Sofia: You literally live in a commune of artists.
Blair: That is the plan we are working towards. Will Leet, her boyfriend is also someone who has inspired me a lot. Because he loves Grateful Dead and loves the 70’s and we are both reincarnations of Jerry Garcia - him- and Janis Joplin - me. One night I took shrooms and went to see his show with his band called AOFINE, which has these really weird Freddie Mercury vibes but it’s new music with all these dudes - I love it. It was an awakening I had, I don’t really know. He has been really helping me find my sound and teaching me guitar as well. I would not be where I am at without those two people. They are definitely a pivotal part of my story.
Blair: I am very 4/20 friendly. Especially nowadays, it's been hard. I am going on this actual spiritual journey and it's been opening wounds and really looking at myself and I need, well I don’t know if I need, but I need a little bit of green at the end of the day, even maybe in the middle of the day. But psychedelics is a totally different story.
Green is something that helps me breathe whereas psychedelics actually open my brain. I mean my best nights have been on psychedelics. I wrote this song called ‘Goodbye’ that is on Spotify and it's about this night where I went out to Wet Noise, my dear friend Matthew Placek's party. It's like an unmarked door, only vinyl was playing. It definitely inspires actual lyrics because I always have the best times. But I can get really deep with it.
Sofia: As deep as you want to get!
Blair: Okay so the other day, I was watching that documentary with that man who is so lovely. Cosmos, do you know who I am talking about?
Nicole: With Neil Degrasse Tyson!
Blair: I love him a lot. But it reminds me, it gives me these really interesting thoughts. I’ll run you through one. I’ve been doing a lot of studying on Aztecs and Conquistadors and all of that. That’s where I’m thriving right now for some reason. I just want to learn everything. And I realized that we are just peasants - *laughs* - we’re just peasants, and Trump is like, our King, and he gives us fake money to eat, sometimes, but keeps us super suppressed so that we can’t revolt or really do anything even though we really try our best, and I think about how that’s gonna be written in time.
In 200 years when people are fucking learning about this shit - it’s gonna be unbelievable. And I mean, maybe not to them, but I’m using this perspective of “Oh yeah, none of this matters.” Is that bad? None of this really matters at all.
So that gives me the freedom to write, and feel comfortable taking up space to write and make art and reminds me that that is important because nothing is important? I feel out of everything the most important thing then would be art because it’s self expression and learning and all that. So I definitely think that drugs open up my mind. They make me think different. But I definitely think I just sounded crazy.
Sofia: No I think I understand exactly what you meant. Weirdly I was like ok I get what she means. Because I just got thrown back to elementary school, and opening up a textbook, and reading about that kind of colonial mindset, and that was just a paragraph I would skip through and keep going. It actually means nothing. In the future - well, we think the time we’re living in right now is so important but it’s really just, gonna be a paragraph in a history book that someone is just gonna glaze over and hope they remember for their test.
Blair: So then why not do whatever the fuck you want to do? Why are you scared? Nobody is gonna care in 50 years, so just do it.Sofia: It puts it into perspective because, like, it’s easy to say that. It’s easy to say “It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter,” but, deep down you’re like… “It matters…”
Blair: It truly doesn’t matter. Like on the Cosmos thing, we are a part of the Milky Way Galaxy, I didn’t know that. And then there’s Andromedon - is that her name? - ok so, they’re super close together. They’re two galaxies. And then it’s this thing where they show you the year - fuck I don’t know how to explain it - but basically, we’re a nanosecond of the whole time that is the universe. In the last couple of seconds of that, Earth is born. So…
Nicole: We’re just a blip. We’re just a little blip.
Blair: But like, not even. Barely even that. So who cares?
Sofia: That’s so true, Blair. Props to you. Never thought that was something we would talk about in one of these things but. I’m loving it.
So super quick. Obviously it’s Latinx Heritage Month and I know that you mentioned briefly that you took some sort of test - and you found out more about your heritage - and so I’m curious to know how that has kind of impacted you’ve viewed yourself, and how that in turn has impacted your art.
Blair: I don’t know how you feel Sofia, but growing up in Texas I always knew I looked different, my eyes were a little slanted, everyone thought I was Japanese. I didn’t know what I was, I knew my mom is Mexican but I didn’t know what that made me. During the whole Black Lives Matter movement, I was wondering what my role in this is. Am I here to learn? Am I here to educate? Am I here to do both? Where do I fit in this?
So it kind of inspired me to go on this journey of “what really am I?” Because nobody seems to know how to tell in my family, no one knows what to say. I have done all of this research and it's not even close to being done and it's the most fun I have ever had in my entire life. I started this project called ‘Conocimiento’ which translates to ‘getting to know’. There is this woman who defines it a little differently and says it means more of a spiritual journey that is only achieved through acts of art like dancing, meditiating, singing, etc - so that is what I titled the project. I did not do 23andMe but both my mom and dad did. It's crazy to compare separately because my mom’s is purple, red, yellow, green and my dad’s is blue, in one part of the world. It is so interesting.
I grew up letting a lot of people, a lot of white people, tell me what I am. A lot of white people would be like “you are white” or “you are so Mexican.” I just let each person decide for themselves what I could be to them just because I didn’t know any better and I didn’t know how much it was truly affecting me. Then I also pulled up ancestry ya’ll and I have built out this huge ass tree and I realized my mom’s lineage is Syrian, Mexican, Mexican, so Mexican and then she married my dad. How could I sit there and let people tell me I was white? This is so obvious, how did I not know this? How did I feel like I wasn’t allowed to identify with this? This is literally how I arrived on this planet, this lineage. So it has definitely changed me. It is definitely changing my heart.
Sofia: I am really curious to know about this idea of ‘Conocimiento’ because that is such a normal word in the Spanish vocabulary. What exactly it is about that idea about learning through art, if you could talk a little bit more about that project.
Blair: I feel like first of all, I read and I believe for myself that humans hold trauma in our DNA in our bodies. It’s part of evolution right. If you are being attacked and you begin to hunch your shoulders your child will learn to hunch their shoulders and so on and so on, it almost becomes a mutation. That is a small example. There have been a lot of things in my life that I feel like I have not understood. Why is this affecting me, why is this triggering me, why why why? I have started to believe it is an ancestral thing. For me that feels really influential. I am not able to talk to my grandparents so there is not a lot of knowledge on the Mexican side of where we come from. So I had to find it myself. I was also feeling very lonely on that journey. I had to be like this is for me. This is for me and my ancestors and our spiritual journey together. They are going to teach me from their stories who I am because the ones who are alive apparently can’t. That inherently is so spiritual. I have been helping a lot of friends start their trees because I am like this shit is crazy you gotta do it and they are like “now what?” and I feel like the only thing to do is process it. Turn it into something. Make a flower of sorts. Make a song. Fucking paint. Because honestly I do not know what else to do with that information other than educate your family if they are willing to listen. So that is that.
Sofia: That is wonderful. I know you spent some time in Texas these last few months. I think your family relocated out of Houston - side note Nicole is from Dallas so she gets it - I am curious to know as you have been going on this journey and Corona happened and most people left New York, I am curious to know about when you came back to Texas and having this knowledge that you have now, how did that impact you viewed yourself in Texas? Like you said, New York you can be anyone.
Blair: Something that was also really obvious when I went home was my queer journey. My mom will ask to go on a walk in the middle of New Braunfels and my hair looks like this. God only knows what I was wearing. Things like that, I feel like in the last year I have really stepped into my identity. Owning that I look queer. Owning that I look different. Instead of being like, okay, if I style my hair like this, I can look normal. I used to do that. When I used to go home I used to make myself look like home, Texas Blair. And now I am like okay we are not doing that anymore! We are going to be you all the time! It’s going to be great! Definitely it was harder in my mind than I think in reality. I think thats just because Corona and everyone is inside.
When I was growing up, I am very light skinned and my mom is much darker, and people would think she was my nanny. And they would stare at us. I didn’t really know it was happening and at the time, it probably affected her more than it did me. At the time. Now, I get extremely triggered when people stare at me on the street. I have a girlfriend now, she is white, white as snow, gorg, but so am I. Through therapy, I have realized when people stare at us, it triggers me from those experiences with my mom when I was younger. I went home for a little bit. There is something about whatever I am serving that is scary or different and people want to look at it. So I am really working through that. But it has been really hard. That is the biggest take away.
Sofia: Totally valid. I think Texas is a really scary place. Us three owe a lot to it, but I can totally see how that sticks with you for the rest of your life. I hate to hear that but I am glad you are working through it. I also wanted to ask about coming to terms with your sexuality and what that has been like if you are feeling comfortable about speaking on that.
Blair: Ya know it has been great. It has been a while now and honestly I forget. I have had gay aunts and uncles and we should have known that this was coming. Like “this was coming.” I always knew I was gay. I remember being younger and thinking “just don’t do it, just don’t. Don’t do it and you will be fine.” I don’t really know what I would identify as, I do sleep with men. But no, no I am gay!
It was definitely hard but as I have grown with it has just been overall a blessing. I am so grateful to be a queer woman because they do some cool ass shit. I didn’t have anything crazy happen to me when I came out, my parents just were like “okay?” They definitely thought it was a phase but no it was not a phase! But ya now I feel like everyone has accepted it and it feels like some people in my family admire me for it because I can just be not scared to talk about it and just be myself. I feel like for a lot of older family members, circumstances were different when they came out and they have been fearful or felt awkward because it was a secret. I am always like “I am gay and I am figuring it out” and it feels like I am almost normalizing being gay in my family? I am gay and I’m cool!
Nicole: Something I keep thinking about - every conversation we have had with people about going home... I love you so much and everything you are saying because fuck! Yes! We are all having to sit and sit with ourselves and figure out our shit right now. I seriously applaud your energy of being like “I am just gonna be me and you are going to have to deal with it”
Sofia: Blair I feel like you have always been unapologetically you. Obviously the circumstances are different and you’ve grown and you’ve changed but you’ve never been afraid to be weird, do whatever the fuck you want - it’s something i have always admired about you. For some people saying “do whatever you want, be weird” it comes across as kind of like, eh, annoying? I don’t want to hear that from some people but I love hearing it from you. Because I believe you when you say you live by that - it’s true, it's embodied in your being, so keep doing you and run with it because it’s actually so awesome to watch and it’s beautiful and inspiring.
Piggybacking off of that, segueing off of that, jumping off of that - let’s talk a bit about your music. Who inspires you? If you could tell us a bit about the direction your music is going in, where that comes from.
Blair: Oh no that’s gonna be a hard one. So what I didn’t say about the Conocimiento Project is that I’m turning this learning about my family into a 7 track album. Did I say that?
Sofia: No, you didn’t, but that’s great! We were curious about that.
Blair: It’s a year's process. It’s gonna take time but I’m gonna do it fucking right. That is definitely having 80s rock vibes. At first I was a little nervous about that because I was like do those things go together? But I was like whatever I’m gonna make it work. Everything’s rock - everything will always be rock - but definitely with some synths and maybe some horns this time. Yeah, I’m very excited about that. What was the other question? Oh right. For a long time I was very obsessed with Janis Joplin. She is someone I feel is not talked about enough and I feel like it’s because she died so young. I consider her the queen of rock; a lot of people say it’s Tina Turner and maybe it also is - I think they can both have the title - because they were both performing at the same time. But Janis was doing it, making songs with her band where Tina was just doing what she was told - that’s still great and amazing and I’m obsessed with Tina Turner, too. Anyone that’s onstage screaming I really love. I gotta be basic and go back to Lady Gaga. When I was younger I was like “you can do that? You can do that?” So she was one of the catalysts of getting me into writing and all that. But Janis Joplin - I love her. Who else? Jimi Hendrix. I’m obsessed. I really love Emily King. I love her as a consumer, as an artist. I don’t really write similar to her at all. You’ve gotta see her live. I saw her last summer in the Park. It was so crazy. It was amazing! She just seems like one of the most gracious humans - I wanna meet her. Definitely also Pat Benitar. Oh I know who I’m missing. I’m crazy! Gloria Estefan of course. She’s who I’m listening to the most nowadays. Her story is crazy. And her daughter, Emily Estefan, who is my age - our age - writes rock music with her girlfriend and I just love that act. I’m really all over the place.
Sofia: So if you could be an opener or go on tour with anyone in a post-pandemic world, who would it be? Dead or alive, we don’t discriminate.
Blair: Oh man. Oh god. I mean.. Can I have two?
Sofia:: Literally whatever you want. There’s no rules in this interview.
Blair: It’s 1962. We’re in San Francisco. Big Brother and the Holding Company - Janis Joplin’s band - is performing. And I open. That’s the dream scenario. I would just love to know what it was like to perform the way they did, with folks passing around drugs and like, people just dancing. I want to be there. But also probably Gloria Estefan. Because that would be insane.
Sofia: So when I ambush FaceTimed you a few days ago you kind of mentioned to me that you were hesitant because you felt the people weren’t ready for what you were bringing. Obviously, I, like you, also really love rock - that’s where I’ve felt myself most in the world of music. And I feel like I don’t really have a lot of female rock stars to look up to. I mean, love Janis, I think she’s great. I guess I don’t really see a lot of that in a modern context. Obviously you have a few here and there but none that kind of bring that same insane energy as Janis. So I guess my question for you is, how do you see yourself bringing that sort of energy into a space where rock is mostly - and always has been - male dominated. If I look at my Spotify it’s all old white dudes. I literally have the same taste as any dad in America. I’m curious to know what you feel you could do to bring the energy that I’ve always craved, always dreamed of, always wanted.
Blair: I think that I have something to say. I feel like there are some gravitational pulls within ourselves and we don’t know why they are there. Like oh, I love strawberries. Or I love going to fucking Barton Springs. I don’t know why that name was the first to come into my head -
Sofia: That was so niche.
Blair: But I feel like I am trying to listen to my inner self that’s saying, “You love rock music, you love putting on a show” - my favorite part of this whole thing is putting on a fucking show. I love just being at 110%. Which really lends itself to rock music and running around a stage. These things I really like. I’m also really queer and really loud about that. I’m also multiracial, angry, queer, and mad about that, too. So I’m just gonna put all that into a bowl and just do it. Because it hasn’t really been done before, I want to do it this specific way. But it’s definitely a challenge. For a long time I wanted an all-female band but I had to give up on that dream just to get the right players that all meshed well together. I feel like as long as I commit to the experience, people will follow. Because I think people need to be told what they want to listen to.
Sofia: Expand on that. Why do you think that?
B: Look at the radio. I don’t listen to the radio. I haven’t listened to the radio in years. I don’t like it. But no judgement against it - if you love the radio that’s cool. I feel like with advertising and social media and TikTok now, these couple of songs are being shoved down our throats at all points, and they’re all pop songs, and most of them have the same producers. So the same issue is now arising that I can see on Broadway where it’s like, all these white men getting to decide which people get to stay in the group, and it’s also happening in the music world. I think it’s because of streaming and social media. I crave a world where I could just put up a poster on the side of the road and people come to my show but that’s not realistic. So I don’t know. I feel like pop is pop, you know, but I think it is so advertised and shoved down our throat that we forget there are other genres. And right now, what’s popular is popular and that’s not rock. But like, anything can happen.
Sofia: I think in the 60s and 70s, I’ve always thought a lot about the question of what exactly pop is, and how pop became its own genre, and how it stems from popular music. “Popular” kind of depends on the time. I agree with you - I wish I lived in the 70s because the market wasn’t oversaturated. Only a very select amount of people had access to a band and instruments and were able to record and go ham. But at the same time, you were being fed what they wanted you to hear at that point in time, too, because the only way you could hear music at that point in time was through the radio. Anyway, it’s interesting because it’s something that I’ve been told is called the Cheesecake Factory effect. When you go to Cheesecake Factory, you have hundreds of options - and almost all of them suck, none of them are gonna be good. Would you rather go to a Cheesecake Factory where you have to choose from a hundred million things, or would you rather go to a restaurant where they only have 4 things on the menu, and it's guaranteed that it’s all gonna be good? I think everything had to be good because music was being released through this very narrow funnel - whereas now, the barriers to entry are so much lower, and anyone can release shit. But people can also release really good stuff - not saying there’s not good shit on Cheesecake Factory’s menu - but anyways.
Nicole: I agree with everything you just said. It’s a data game now. It’s no longer about quality. It’s about algorithms. It’s about what’s gonna shoot up on TikTok because there’s a verse and a chorus that sounds catchy, but no one is ever gonna hear the whole entire song, so we’ll put that at the front? We just have to reshape the industry again and bring it back to what’s good.
Blair: But I have faith that that’s happening a little bit. Lizzo is using real instruments and writing real lyrics.
Nicole: I think that because of the over-saturation, simultaneously, people who are doing the right stuff are able to thrive and be noticed as well. I was watching Mark Ronson do a whole break down, using some records and starting. The people who know about it are making the change.
Hashika: I also think social media has really changed the game of music. I think that what’s really been disheartening to me is seeing fandoms form - even like streaming parties and using VPNs and putting a lot of emphasis on charts - and it not really being about music anymore and it being about putting the artist on this pedestal and making them number one. It’s just the fans who are doing it. Outside of the fandom who is really streaming the music? Is this a really good song? I think that’s been disturbed and you don’t really see that.
Sofia: That’s such a good point. Fandoms are really shaping the charts. And if fandoms are what we use as a metric for what’s good, how does it make room for someone like Blair - who doesn’t have a fandom like BTS because she’s growing and budding and learning - how do you even make room for people who are so talented but simply don’t have that audience because they’re not influencers? It just means that the quality of music is instantly lowered ten notches, if you ask me.
Nicole: But being in our program, I feel like every single kid that got into the Music Business program is like “Oh my god, so much is happening, we have to change stuff.” They are feeling these anxieties of how do we alleviate, how do we help artists learn from the ground up of what’s going on. Every single one of my professors was like “Shit’s going down and you guys are gonna have to fix it…” It’s so good that we’re having these conversations and it’s so exciting, Blair, to see you doing your thing. I feel it in my heart and soul that this is gonna be huge. You’re so captivating and I'm so excited for you. We’re here to do the damn thing!
Sofia: I have one question that might take a second. I’m really interested in how you mentioned that you don’t like attention, and how that stems from something that happened to you regularly when you were younger that traumatized you in some capacity. But at the same time, I’ve seen you on a stage and you dominate it and you own it. And I’ve seen videos of you performing and you own it, and you’re not afraid to say you own it. You live kind of a double life. On the street you’re like “No one look at me, please, I’m figuring out why but just don’t,” but then on stage you’re like “Everyone look at me, I love it”. How do you deal with that double life you lead?
Blair: I’ve not thought about it this way and that’s interesting but right off that bat what I think of - god off the bat we’re gonna go for it you guys - the biggest issue that I go through is being sexualized. I struggle. I’m just trying to go to the fucking store, man. I’m just trying to go to the fucking store with my cute little top on that I put on because I want to look cute, for me. And also being a gay woman, and holding my girlfriend’s hand, also brings a lot of sexualization that I don’t love. So those moments of not wanting to be looked at are usually either because I feel threatened by men or I’m in a really white neighborhood and I’m being stared at because I look different. When I’m performing, the people that are there are my people. And I don’t mind if they look at me. I’m like “Yeah, look at me, let’s all look at each other, and be together. I’m gonna get you out of your comfort zone and you’re gonna dance now.” It doesn’t even feel like people are looking at me. It feels like I’m trying to get them to let go of whatever they’re holding on to. So it feels very different. I’ve never thought about it side by side like that and it’s super interesting. I would think the normal answer for a lot of musicians and artists would be “I’m somebody different on stage.” I’m definitely the same person. I am me and I go on stage and I’m the same fucking person. I think it’s because my biggest goal in all of this is to write music that’s relatable and good for people like me, and when I’m putting on a show, create a safe space where people feel free to move their fucking bodies - we don’t do that enough anymore - and like, meet people. That’s what I’m trying to, so I don’t think I even have time to think about what I look like. Which is maybe why I love it so much - because it takes me out of myself. Thanks for making me think about that.
Sofia: Just here to reveal to you the yin and yang that is Blair.
Blair: Yes.
Sofia: Last question. What is the best advice that you’ve received as a budding artist. That ties into what’s coming next, what’s gonna come after this besides your Conocimiento project. Well, I guess your Conocimiento project is kind of what’s coming out of this.
Blair: Yeah. Yes. Okay. Okay. I think I’m 2 for the advice. So Sammy Rae once was like - oh fuck I’m not gonna quote it right - but she was like, “Energy cannot be created nor destroyed. Kay? Science.” and she was telling me, “If you put energy into this, and energy into anything, and energy into what you want, a project, whatever - something has to come from it. Whatever it is. You’re putting that energy out into the world and that creates chain effects and things are gonna happen. Maybe it’s not how you imagined it, maybe it’s not what you want, but no matter what you do, you’re putting this energy in and something’s gonna happen.” And that was really good advice because, especially living in New York and just being a millennial and all this stuff, we need instant gratification. Things aren’t happening fast enough. We have a warped idea of what success looks like, so that was something that really helped me. So then the other one was this girl named Nicole Kang - when I met her she went to NYU Tisch and now she’s Batwoman on the CW. She just moved to LA, she’s a celebrity now and I’m obsessed! She was like, “Listen.” This is before I even went to college. She said, “People may not like you. You’re different. People may not like you! But the ones that do are gonna fucking love you. And that’s what really matters. So who cares?” She was the first person who opened my eyes to the concept that people may not like what I’m fucking serving. And that’s fine. That’s their loss. But she said, “Don’t let it dissuade you. Don’t let it put you down. It’s a natural part of life and it’s gonna happen.” So those were very helpful things that I learned.
What was the second question? What’s next for my career? I’m in the process of solidifying my band again because people had to move, people left, whatever. I’m also planning on releasing an EP, with five songs. So it would be the three that are already out plus two. And the longer plan is the Conocimiento project, that will take a while. I’m also making a music video for “Mirror” - and if you haven’t listened to “Mirror” it’s fucking crazy you guys. Rock, balls to the walls, and we’re getting investors. We’re such babies!