For our March New Moon Spotify Playlist, we’re featuring Kelly McFarling. Kelly is an Atlanta, GA born, San Francisco-based songwriter. Her work is reflective of transitions, the wilderness, and its navigation. Her most recent album, Water Dog, was featured in Paste and Noisey. The lead single “Records” has received over 3 million streams on Spotify since it’s release.
Featured Artist: Kelly McFarling
Follow Kelly McFarling on Spotify, Soundcloud, Apple Music, and her website.
Q: Your song “Records” leads off our second ‘New Moon’ playlist. We were drawn to the spare arrangements and the passing conversation happening between the vocal and the banjo accompaniment. What was the impetus for this song?
Records to me feels like a window song. I have a flash bulb memory of mornings in my home from this period of my life, and Records happened as a way to preserve that memory. Settling into love, realizing that there is both a weight and lightness to that, and that every moment we have is fleeting.
Q: We read in an interview that your new album ‘Water Dog’ was written as a love letter to San Francisco. What is it about your home that acts as such a strong muse?
I think that it’s inevitable that place is a muse. It’s impossible to not be affected by your physical surroundings. The air you breathe, the way the light hits things, it actually colors your perspective. For me San Francisco has given me so many different palettes in the time I’ve spent here. Water Dog was written in a powerful Pacific themed palette. I had just moved out to Ocean Beach and it felt like diving in. The ocean is such a powerful force to be reminded of daily, and I became both cradled and humbled and frightened and exhilarated by it. I was thinking a lot about the power of water to move things, change and carve them, and how we respond to and flow with that force. Love is like that, and I was also being greatly affected, moved, and shaped by the power of that force.
Q: The desert landscape surrounding our home in Joshua Tree gives us a strong sense of solitude. Do you seek out solitude while writing?
Solitude is something I cherish, and enjoy. Inevitably writing happens for me in quiet parts of my life and mind. But often for me, I seek motion for writing. I need a certain amount of chaos and movement to shift things around and show me new ways to know and say things. I love the desert so much. The first time I came west I went to New Mexico and was completely shaken with my love for the open sky and the dramatic naked landscapes. It always makes me think about water to be in the desert, because I can see so clearly where the water has been and what it has done. To me, that’s such an amazing planetary time machine vantage point.
Q: During the New Moon, the unusual darkness of the moon gives added visual emphasis to the stars and planets. Do you think the understated feel of your songs brings forward elements that typically go unnoticed in more dense arrangements?
Hmmm – hadn’t thought of it in that way, but I like that. I have always loved space in music. I think there is a lot to be gained from sitting in the darkness. This record to me was an inward record.
Q: What purpose does music serve in your life?
It’s a constant companion.
About the New Moon Playlist
On the New Moon, the earth, moon, and sun align making us unaware of the moon’s presence in the sky. Without the visual presence and glow of the moon, other celestial bodies typically hidden now shine brighter. Our chances of seeing the sky clearly are heightened on this day, making it a day of clarity and new beginnings. Creatively it’s the perfect time to set intentions for a new cycle of dreams and goals, and ways of manifesting them.
To honor this monthly opportunity for fresh starts and creative beginnings, we’ve asked our friend and musician we admire, Chase McBride, to curate a monthly New Moon Spotify playlist.
Follow The Joshua Tree House on Spotify and be the first to hear new playlists. Last month’s New Moon Spotify Playlist featured Montreal artist Ora Cogan.
