Elise Davis
Interview conducted April 05, 2021
By Dan Locke
What is your upbringing? How did you discover music? Why did you wait until you were 13 to start writing music?
I knew from a very young age that I loved music. The earliest I can remember is being 8 years old and loving Jackson 5 and Shania Twain. I remember being 9 years old in the back of my dad’s car and hearing Jewel on the radio and just feeling enamored. I asked my dad to buy me her CD after that and I listened to the whole thing over and over-there is a pretty dark song on their called “Daddy” that talks about abuse and racism. Although I had no idea what she was talking about I couldn’t stop listening. I think that is because of the rawness of emotion I could hear; I was so attracted to it.
By the time I was 11, I decided I wanted to start an all-girls rock band and I got a drum kit and started taking lessons. I liked it but I quickly realized I didn’t like the fact that I couldn’t mind my own business and practice in my room. The kit was too big for my room and everyone was annoyed when I played because it was so loud (haha). So, I switched over to guitar and began taking guitar lessons. I took lessons from a blind woman who lived down the street from me which was really interesting. She would give me charts and just tell me if I was doing it right by listening. The all-girl rock band wasn’t working out but I was still loving learning guitar.
When I was 12, I wanted to go see the band Bush in downtown Little Rock, AR but my parents said no. (Really, I was wanting to hang out with some 16-year-old boys and sneak cigarettes and my parents knew). I got so upset they said no that I ran away from home. I went about a mile down the road and sat in a cul-de-sac feeling happy at the thought of them worrying about me. After about an hour, it was getting cold and I decided to walk back home. When I went inside, I realized no one had even noticed I had left. Everyone in my house was doing what they were doing when I had left. I was livid! haha. I ran up to my room and my guitar was on my bed. I had never thought about singing or songwriting before, it really had never even crossed my mind, but that day I grabbed my guitar, locked myself in my bathroom, and wrote my first song. It was called “Big House” about feeling alone in a big house. It was as if I had discovered the most amazing secret in the world. I felt so much better after and I was hooked. I am now 32 years old and have been writing songs ever since. It is truly the way I process the world.
How did you get your first guitar, and do you still have it?
My first guitar was a hand-me-down from my dad. It was a Seagull acoustic guitar. My dad played but not a ton and told me I could have it. Of course, being 12/13 I covered it with stickers, painted parts of it pink. Yes, I still have it and it is a treasured part of my guitar collection.
What is your guitar of choice now? Year, make and model? And does she have a name?
In the last 5-6 years I went from playing mostly acoustic to playing mostly electric. On tour, I bring both but only ending up breaking out the acoustic for a show or two. Playing electric is just so damn fun! My bandmate built my guitar of choice which I have been playing for the last 6 years. It is a Telecaster, mixed with some parts of other types of guitars. it’s a bit of a “Franken-caster”. She is yellow, and lightweight, stays in tune well, and one of my best friends. Nah, I haven’t named her, but she knows I love her.
Describe your music.
My songs are all born from very personal honest places, so I would describe my music as raw and honest. I try and have different flavors in the way I produce all my albums but I could say a consistent thread in my music is that it has a rock edge to it. So yeah… simply put, I think my music is vibey, a bit edgy, and honest.
What was your first performance like?
It was with my high school band in front of my high school. We were called The Sandbox Lizards. I was nervous as hell and we probably sounded pretty crappy, haha, but I am happy I started playing live young because I think I learned a lot about performing early on.
What makes a good songwriter?
In my opinion, what makes a good songwriter is someone who writes because it fills their soul. What makes a good songwriter is a writer who would do it regardless of if they ever get famous or have success. They do it because it is their calling and their happy place.
What was the title of your first original song? Did you record it?
The title of my first song is “Big House”. I was 12 years old. No, I never recorded it- thank goodness.
What is your process of writing music like?
I am always making notes on my phone. Whether it’s simply a word that I think about that inspires me, or a title idea, or a verse, hell, sometimes I will wake up at 3:30 in the morning with an idea and type a whole song in my phone. But the point is, I am always writing down ideas as I think of them. Then I like to find time when I have the house to myself and I will smoke some weed and just begin playing. Sifting through ideas I have jotted down until one sticks then I roll with it. Then I usually revisit it over and over, making edits, until it gets to a place where I can play it from top to bottom and it feels good all the way through. Sometimes, if I am lucky, I will sit down and complete a song fully in 20 or 30 minutes, it just pours out quickly and works. I love when that happens.
Do you remember the first time you give your first solo EP to someone?
Yes, after I started writing songs I was obsessed and came from school every day and went straight to my room to write. By the time I was 13 I had a few composition notebooks full of songs. The music director at my school was a mid-20’s hippie type guy who played in bands. I went to him to share some songs when I got up the courage. He was stoked and so supportive. He is actually the one who ended up recording my first demos and remains a friend to this day.
Tell me about your album “Anxious Happy Chill”?
This album is interesting for me because I wrote it after experiencing SO many life changes. I had lived my whole 20s a bit wildly. I also had sort of come to the conclusion that I wasn’t really meant for relationships. I had messed so many up my whole life I thought I would be better off touring, having occasional boyfriends, and living mostly no-strings-attached. That is what my whole last album Cactus is about, being a “lone wolf”.
Anyway, after I finished that album, I met someone who I am now married to and he has changed my life in so many ways. “Anxious. Happy. Chill.” has many truly happy love songs on it which is definitely a first for me! I have written so many songs about lust, heartbreak, infatuation, loneliness, sex, flings, but not love in the deep committed long-term sense. This album has that and it feels good. But it also has songs about success/failure, aging, my growing dislike of social media. It’s a bit of a soup of an album so to speak- paired with many ‘a grungy guitar tracks and tasty mellotron.
How was it to create an album during the lockdown?
Really weird. I am used to the studio being also a social experience. I like bringing the whole tracking band in together to have drinks/share meals/rehearse songs and try different things out. We began recording this right when the pandemic came into full swing and decided to basically do the whole thing just me and my producer. We had an amazing drummer, Fred Eltringham, come in for one day to track drums. But other than that, it was just me and my producer, Teddy Morgan, wearing masks when we arrived to the studio until I was able to get into the vocal booth. Then we communicated through headphones and the glass wall the whole process. However, although it was different it did allow for an intimate secluded experience that in the end was very therapeutic, creative, and enjoyable.
Tell me about the song “Summertime”?
Oooo I love this one. I am someone who experiences depression off and on throughout my life and I have always found warm weather to be easier times for me. I love being outside. I love feeling connected to nature. I love drinking tequila in a cotton summer dress feeling the night on my skin, looking up at the sky for hours. “Summertime” is a very simple literal song about my love of warm weather. Life is always filled with worries, I personally am a very anxious worrier type person, (working on it), but for me the worries are easier to handle in summer weather with the flowers and the colors and the growth.
What is your favorite track on your album?
I have two. My favorites are “Summertime” and “Another Year”.
How do you stay healthy while performing?
Mehhhh…. I certainly drink too much and probably smoke too much weed. I eat generally healthy and try to still exercise when I am on the road. Sometimes those things are hard to maintain on the road- depending on the tour. I try to do what I can. Even though I drink every night on tour, as time has gone by, I have been better about stopping not too long after the show and switching to water. (Not always though! Haha whenever I play shows in New York in particular I ended up bar hopping all night after, it’s too fun there not to.) However, no doubt that practicing healthy habits as much as you can is imperative on tour if you want to sustain putting on good shows the whole month or however long the tour is.
Digital vs. vinyl?
Both? Love spinning vinyls, but digital sounds great too and is often more convenient.
What song from the past have you been listening to lately? Moreover, what does that song mean to you?
Lately, I have been revisiting Wilco’s album “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot”. That album as a whole just reminds me of my early 20s and makes me feel good.
If “Video Killed the Radio Star” do you think that the Covid-19 virus has killed live music? Do you feel the Covid-19 virus going to affect the music business in the future?
Yes, it has affected and is definitely going to affect many things. I have no idea when touring will be quite what it used to. My booking agent predicts 2022 possibly. But many music venues across the US have had to shut down due to the pandemic, which is so sad to think about. And bands that had tours booked when it started have kept rescheduling and rescheduling- now many of the venues already have holds of 20-30 acts a night for the coming year. It is a bit of a shit show. I don’t have the answers or know what to think about what is ahead. I think it will come back, I think things will thrive again, but I think there will be a lot of changes from the way things were pre-covid and there is still a long road to recovery.
What have you been doing with your quarantine? Have you discovered or rediscovered any new hobbies?
Yes! Last year was so crazy for me being home all the time. I have spent my entire adult life as a touring musician and was always coming and going. I never had plants or a garden because I knew I wouldn’t be around to tend to it- but it has always been something I wanted to do. So, during quarantine, I planted a garden and I grew tons of vegetables which was so much fun for me. I have also been learning Spanish and become a pretty damn good cook as well. I am pretty good at keeping myself entertained and enjoy solitude. So, I’ve been spending a lot of my time cooking, writing music, reading, making art.
In the past if a musician stops doing music, they find a new career. For example, David Lee Roth from Van Halen became a licensed EMT in NY for 6 years, San Spitz (guitarist for Anthrax) became a master watchmaker, Dee Snider (Twister Sister) did voice over work for SpongeBob SquarePants. If you couldn’t do music what would you like to be doing?
I have pondered this question many times. There are a few things I could see myself doing….an illustrator for an animated TV show, an elementary/middle school art teacher, or a social worker.
What is your happy place?
My happy place is a day with a completely open schedule, nowhere to be, where I can write music and create art. With my husband somewhere in the house doing his own thing. And of course, a warm summer day with lots of sun. 🙂
