Anna Shoemaker – Everything Is Embarrassing
Anna Shoemaker released her alt-pop EP on February 28, 2020 via BMG and this Brooklyn based singer-songwriter has some down to earth, real life stories to share with you. She does it in a way that feels raw but glossy. How – you might ask – I’ve asking myself the same question.
There’s an organic flow to the way she puts down her lyrics on tape. It feels more like sitting across from a friend listening to what they are going through rather than hearing a song being played through your earbuds. That’s that heart on your sleeve, rawness. The glossy side is the production aspect of the record. Imaginative beats, a really good mix and six vocal performances that will get you lost in the tone.
There’s something special about her voice and the best way I can explain it is to compare it to another unique and special vocalist – Nelly Furtado. She’s got flow. She’s got quickness. She’s got these little intricacies when she’s laying down lines that seemingly come natural to her but leave listeners in awe of what she just did. The same way I felt when I initially heard Furtado for the first time. But Anna is no tribute act. I make the comparison so you understand the vocal height I’m talking about. She’s blazing her own path and ready for people to hear what she has to say.
I caught up with her to talk about the new record and more. One of the first things we talked about was the title for the EP – Everything Is Embarrassing. Shoemaker tells Sound Vapors, “I had five songs that I recorded down in Nashville with JT Daly and I came up with the “Everything Is Embarrassing” concept when I was writing one of those songs in-particular. I was writing, So Low. I was down in Nashville. I was staying in an Air Bnb by myself. I live in New York and I was away from all of my friends and thinking a lot about my life in New York and having that FOMO, fear of missing out. I was just having a lot of anxiety down there and I just kind of wrote that line, “everything is embarrassing”, about how everyone has these feelings. Everyone has these feelings of missing out. Everyone has these feelings of anxiety. So I thought, if everyone feels this way, is it really that big of a deal? If it’s always going to pass is it really that big of a deal, right now? I just wanted to express that and I think it comes up a lot in my songs. Like these universal feelings of insecurities and heartbreak and stuff like that – so that’s what I wanted to talk about.”
I was surprised to learn that the first five songs were recorded in Nashville and the last song, ‘Someone’, was a late edition to the EP. Shoemaker explains, “I got into the studio with my friend Will and I wrote this song. I was feeling a lot of heartbreak at the time too. I wrote this song and I brought it to my manager and I was like, we need to put this on EP. Because for me it was about where my music was going. The stuff I did in Nashville was where my music was and where it is right now and that’s great but I think that someone was really pointing into a new direction. Making music with one of my best friends in Brooklyn. Near my apartment. Near my family. It felt really, really personal in a different way than the other stuff felt.”
I love that she put that song last on the record because It feels like that there’s a sneak preview of that next chapter. Shoemaker exclaims, “Yeah, totally! It just felt very effortless. Whereas the stuff I did with JT, we worked really hard on it. The writing and stuff came effortless but there was more. He’s such a great producer. The sessions, there’s a lot of thinking like, Okay, what are we doing here, here and here. With Will it was just a different kind of session. Both are great situations to be in. It’s totally a different vibe and I don’t think I’d ever experienced the hang-out, writing session vibe before.”
Our interview took us to a few different places and it was really interesting to get her point of view on writing songs on how she got started down that path. I got a kick listening to her explain when she started to learn how to play the guitar. She’s real and she’s good people with an extremely good talent. That’s probably the answer to my initial question. That emotional rawness + gloss = Anna Shoemaker.
You can hear my entire conversation with Anna Shoemaker by clicking on the link to your favorite place to listen to podcasts.
-Tommy Marz
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