MaeThePirate, an electronic dance pop sensation, sails into 2023 with her captivating new EP, 'Neon,' where she seamlessly blends her unique cello talent with euphoric pop-infused sounds. A sonic trailblazer, Mae mesmeriSes her audience with an enchanting musical journey that not only touches on modern life's complexities but also emphasises the silver linings amidst its struggles. We sat down with Mae to learn all about the EP, her creative process and so much more in this exclusive in-depth interview. Check it out below!
--
What's the story behind your stage name MaeThePirate?
I made the name maethepirate as a bit of a play on words, my last name “Higgins” distantly means “Viking” but when I first started putting out music I thought “pirate” was much cooler! I wanted something strange and unique to be behind the name just like it is in the music and the sound, because adding cellos to your music and singing brutally honest lyrics about social media is a little strange and I wanted people to know what they’re getting themselves into!
Can you tell us more about your musical style and how you incorporate the cello into your electronic dance-pop tracks?
My musical style is heavily influenced by dramatic video game orchestral music, and also electronic dance music I listened to when I was a child like Cascada, Nightcore, or today’s equivalent, hyperpop. It took me a long time to find the right way to incorporate cello, I tend to do more of a celtic or jazz cello chop than classical cello performance. Using a chop allows me to do rhythms similar to guitar strumming, but also have that deep, string tone only found in bowed instruments. The cello also is very flexible because you can go very high up on the fingerboard to emulate a violin, which is probably my favourite spot to play. The pluck, the chop, and the legato give a lot of leeway for style and sound, with the chop creating a driving sound, the pluck giving a cutesy sound, and the legato giving that beautiful cello tone we all know and love. You can even vary the sound by the type of pluck you do, some being harsher, while the classical technique giving a more mellow sound. The cello is mostly in the same range as the guitar, so I think it’s only a matter of time before we see more cellists in pop music.
Could you elaborate on the concept of your EP 'Neon' and how it reflects your one-of-a-kind approach to music?
Neon is one of my favourite albums to date. I liked the idea of naming it “Neon” because the songs on the album have this very electric feel to it. The songs are bright, they’re driving, they fill you with a sort of euphoria that I feel is often felt when outside under shining neon lights. They’re very ethereal too, as is most of my music, so using a gas that emits light I felt like really embodied those songs.
I chose it because the album is also about turning some negative feelings into positives, with Night Terrors being about, as titled, Night Terrors, but instead of dwelling on the negative feelings, asking the listener or the conceptual friend and lover of the listener, I know I have these feelings, but will you love me? Will you cherish me? Mid-July is about worries in a relationship, and instead of thinking about that, we focus on how positive the person makes you feel. The idea of a gas, usually invisible, emitting light, shows that sometimes you can find light within the feelings that are invisible.
Stream the full EP here:
How would you describe the essence of your lead single 'Botellón' and what message were you trying to convey through the song?
I wrote botellon after a long call with some of my friends I made online, chatting and laughing and having a good time, when the energy of the call turned from fun and uplifting to melancholic. We talked about how amazing it would be if we were in the same room, truly experiencing this wonderful night together. We can laugh and enjoy eachothers company, but something about their physical closeness was heavily missed. I may have been physically alone that night, but someone, far out in the distance, was laughing with me. I may not see them, may not be able to hold and touch them, but they’re there. Botellon is a story embodying this idea. It centres around the listener, alone in their room, dancing to the music.
They might be alone, but if they look out the window and think, there is probably someone dancing with them, far away. I used the word Botellon because it is a Spanish word about street parties, parties that take place in the streets. It was a story of running into the street and expressing joy, dancing, and knowing that it isn’t scary because someone, somewhere far away, is dancing too. We are never really alone, and somewhere far outside your bedroom window, someone is dancing.
Can you talk about your process of creating music and how you bring together the production, melodies, and lyrics to create infectious tracks?
Lyrics define the energy of the songs I write. When I start writing a song, the energy of what I sing about must be brought into the way the cello part plays. Usually I will have full lyrics and harmony before I start the cello playing, since there are so many ways to play the instrument, I need to make sure I choose the right method. With such an unorthodox approach to pop music, I have to make sure all the sounds blend! When it comes to lyric writing, I almost always start with lyrics and harmony before creating a cello part that will really show that emotion.
Sometimes though, I will start with the cello. If I can find a cool cello melody that tugs at my heart-strings and emits an emotion I can pinpoint, I’ll centre the song around that melody. Other times I’ll find a cool double-stop pattern (which is playing two strings at once on the cello) then I can record that and create the foundations of a track, lay down the drums and do it that way! The most common way I write though, is starting with piano and vocals.
Once I have a barebones track with harmony and lyrics, I’ll create orchestral sheet music in Musescore. I’ll start by using a synthesiser to emulate the strings, and once I have a string part emulated, turn that part into sheet music. I separate my cello parts between chorus, verse, and pre-chorus, usually with 3-10 different specific lines in each part. Sometimes I’ll have just 3 lines to create a chord, but usually I get a bit more creative than legato chords, and I write melodies with harmonies for each section of the song into sheet music I can then read and play. Since I work at an old jingle house turned film studio, they have a full setup for music and I tend to go there during off-hours alone.
Typically, the off-hours would be in the dead of night. I’ll print out my sheet music, put them on the stand, put my session in “loop record” mode, and get to playing. Loop record mode will continuously record the same section indefinitely until you click to stop. It’ll take a bit of practice to get the sound that I want, but once I feel I’ve really nailed the part, and have the sound, I’ll play it and then snap my fingers, or click my tongue. This is a helpful trick for self-recording, because when I snap or click my tongue, it makes a very distinct visual waveform called a transient. Only really sharp, fast sounds would make this shape, so I can visually discern what is a snap and what is cello playing by looking at the tracks after I record.
This lets me play the part many times over and get layers without having to get up and stop the recording, I can smoothly play it many times and I’ll be able to identify the good, chosen takes later. I do each line multiple times, so it really sounds like an entire cello section is playing that one line.
I’ll even sometimes move the microphone and play it again, to get varying distance, and record myself multiple times so that when it plays back, it feels like there’s an entire cello section, with some having more distance, and some being much closer. When I feel I have enough layers for one line, I move onto the next, and loop record again. I’ve actually run out of voices in Pro Tools, which has a limit of 768 audio tracks, when I was recording the orchestral section of my song Everything’s Fine, and really wanted to make the orchestra extremely full. Once I’m done with all of the sheet music, and all of the layers, I walk back to the control room and look for the transients of my snaps. That tells me which cello tracks were the sound I wanted, I export those, and take them back to the original track to add special effects, vocals, and more.
This method of recording allows me to be creative and get the best takes possible, and emulate the real orchestral sound.
- What's coming next for you?
I’m so glad you asked! I actually have a companion album to “Neon” called “Xenon”! It is also 5 songs, and just like the difference between these two noble gasses, one is more commercially used, and one is slightly more unique. The second portion of this chemically named duo is more blunt, while Neon talks about more generic life feelings that anyone can identify with, Xenon puts a comical fun spin on some awful personal life experiences. “High” is about leaving my abusive ex and feeling the euphoria when I moved out and escaped. There is one song on Xenon named in very pop-punk fashion called “I’m Still Mad At The Girls Who Were Mean To Me In Grade School” which talks about my experiences with the mean girls in elementary school.
I always try to turn negatives into positive, so the song contains comical, lighthearted digs at these girls from my past, with big, bombastic cello lines adding the theatrical energy of a 1940 silent film’s comedic sequence. They include a lot of sliding notes, where I run my fingers across the cello fingerboard, which adds a lighthearted feel. If the cello could speak in slapstick humour, the slide would be how it would do it.
Quite like the similarities between neon and xenon, I talk about my experiences with the two sexes respectively, with another called “How To Make Men Respect You” because if I’m going to slander one gender, I think I have to bring up the other! I’ve been waiting to put these out for a long time because putting one out without the other would be unfair and demeaning. The songs on Xenon I amSO excited about, and I also have a show coming up at TRiP Santa Monica California, where I’ve already programmed my lighting fixtures and even some lasers that can paint patterns and images, to really put the energy of the music into a visual format that everyone can see and understand. I have a passion for lighting, a passion for music, and a passion for turning that frown upside down.
Comments