Drew Hackney Perspective on Hounds of Valhalla

Perhaps. I'm not sure if it was the chicken or the egg, you know? Has it made me lonely being an artist, or am I simply just the type of person who documents their experiences with loneliness in a more concrete way, by turning sadness and grief into the joy of making music. I wouldn't be able to survive without it. 

Life informs the creative process in every way, so I feed like they just feed each other, like an ourobouros. I love reading books and watching plays and movies and of course listening to music and I feel like those all inform my art in one way or another. I'm equally as influenced by the Kurts, Cobain and Vonnegut, as I am by Andrew Lloyd-Webber and Wu-Tang. It all makes an impact. I sometimes get particularly into certain pieces of music or film or literature and it can really drive me a little crazy once it morphs from enjoyment into obsession. I've always been a very active and engaged music listener but since I started producing all my own stuff in 2017, it's hard to listen to anything that much without trying to pick it apart and recreate it in my head. 

I love grafitti. There's so much beautiful grafitti nowadays, it seems like. Don't get me wrong, there's definitely some trash. But it seems like that medium has  really blossomed into something interesting and special. I love oil paintings too. I love going to all the incredible art museums we have in this country. The MoMa in New York, the Art Institute in Chicago, the Hirschhorn in DC, NOMA in New Orleans, and obviously many more, but those are my favorites. My mother is an artist. 

In no particular order:

Warren Zevon

Walter Becker

Donald Fagen

Nighthawks by Edward Hopper. I've gotten to see it a bunch of times at the Art Institute in Chicago. It's so beautiful and mysterious.

Absolutely. I miss teaching because that was paid practice! And I was on fire when I was practicing 8 hours, 4 days a week. I was always nice and loose at band practice during those times. I used to practice to get better but now I practice to develop my voice when it comes to songwriting. When you think you don't need to practice, you're always wrong. You can never practice enough. 

I just put it out there however I can. I don't really play it for people anymore because I think that elicits a certain perception of an expectation that may or may not be true. I don't want anyone to feel like I'm pressuring them to only say good things about it, or to have a positive reaction. I'd rather get a negative reaction from it than no reaction at all. 

The first, and as yet perhaps the only, blogger that has ever written about me called my music "Becker and Fagen worship" and that was pretty high praise. Also, a friend of a friend told me my "music sounds like Peter Gabriel." I think he thought I was going to be offended but I think that's one of the best compliments I've ever gottten, whether he meant it that way or not! 

That's a great question, if you have any ideas, comment below... LOL. I'm terrible at describing my own music. 

Thoughful. Sincere. Thorough.

Something. Anything. I feel like music has such a passive experience for so many modern humans that to command anyone's attention long enough to elicit any kind of feeling at all, even if it's total hatred of it, I think I've done my job. 

On a huge deck overlooking an ocean (or a particularly large lake in midwestern USA) with a nice size crowd that is very into it. Ocean breeze blowing in my hair optional.

Franz Liszt. How cool would that have been?

Any of the absolute classics, I guess. Bach. Mozart. Beethoven. The Beatles.

They're all my babies and I love each one of them for a different reason. But I'll have to say Hounds of Valhalla just becasue of the sheer amount of sonic space we created and filled up, and tore down, and built it all over again a dozen times. That song was such hard work. Though it naturally revealed its structure over time, it took the song about 3 years to really congeal into the piece it is today. A Bull in His Very Own China Shop is another favorite. Steven Stewart (of TripleWide and my brother in Smashed Cardinals, formerly of Southern Groove Society) absolutely slayed all the guitar tracks I made him lay down that day. But we were FIRED UP! I loved that session.

Minute I Fake by Nice Bison. I wrote it down directly after waking up in about 5 minutes. I still to this day feel like someone sang it to me in a dream and I just wrote it down.

Death, suicidal ideations, abandonment, heartbreak... But also happiness and the pursuit thereof, as well as human rights and friendships broken. Many songs about friendships and relationships starting and ending, generally trying to tie their existence into some higher theme in my life. Politics, love, loss. 

Stephen Malkmus or Ben Folds. They're huge heroes of mine and it would just be cool to absorb some of their innate coolness via osmosis. 

I actually think that my two existing solo albums are companion pieces, The Missive for the first Trump era and Parrot for 2020 and the aftermath of that election. I write a lot of political songs, but I usually try to make them a little oblique on not so on-the-nose. But "A Bull in His Very Own China Shop" was my direct response to Trump's inauguration day in 2017, writing furiously as I watched the news coverage. It's one of those rare songs that just poured out of me in about 15 minutes' time. War du Jour is also very political, as well as Everywhere (and Nowhere). I'm trying to sort of get the political stuff out while I'm fired up about it so who knows, that may be a part of my music forever. I may never not be fired up about it. 

Listening to The Beatles with my parents. They had gotten a bunch of cassettes to play for me while I was in my mom's womb, and left them in my room for me to one day discover. It didn't take long. By 2, I already knew every word to Ticket to Ride, Eight Days a Week, Love Me Do, and a slew of other Beatles favorites. I learned to harmonize from singing 3-part harmony with my parents (I always took the 5th(. 

I'm Drew Hackney and I write relatable songs about feelings and situations we're all familiar with, but maybe sometimes leave unspoken or unexpounded upon. I like to explore the depths of those awkward and telling moments of our lives that maybe we'd sometimes rather forget.