A 27-year-old musician and songwriter from Ohio, Abby Holliday frequently jumps between genres and uses a variety of acoustic and electronic sounds. She is an artist full of wildcards. During her live show at Schubas Tavern on March 13, she even used auto tune on stage, which I have never seen an artist do before.
Holliday’s songs provide hope and prosperity for those down on their luck in life. She somehow manages to weave fables about life into catchy beats. In her song “crack a smile come on stay a while,” she sings “Every little part of life has a little bit of death/Everything you thought was real was only in your head.” These profound statements could not ring more true.
I had the pleasure of interviewing Abby Holliday during her recent Chicago show at Schubas Tavern. Not only did we have a cracking time (we cracked many smiles and stayed for a while), I got to sell her merch! It felt like a big treat as the first time I’ve officially been a merch seller. I am so grateful I got to learn more about Abby and her journey as a musician.
Here is a transcription of the conversation we had in the Schubas green room:
CL: My first question is: When and How did you start playing music? Take me through the process of finding your voice as an artist.
AH: Well, I was very interested in guitar from a young age. My dad is a drummer as well!
AH: I had some musical connections in my family and I started taking lessons for guitar when I was 15. I had one of those teachers that was just like very ‘by the book’ and I don’t know the way that he was teaching me I just wasn’t excited about guitar. I told my mom “I just don’t think I want to do this.” She found me a different guitar teacher who ended up being like such a perfect match to me. He taught me how to play songs that I wanted to play, which is very exciting.
CL: That’s the best. I took piano lessons as a kid and like my teacher, Mrs. Lundgren, was kind of a witch of a person. I snuck in her basement. I was kind of a fiend.I understand that feeling of not finding your niche and then finding the teacher that really understands you.
AH: Being paired up with him changed everything for me. I took guitar lessons for 6 months with him and then he kind of got busy and so did I so I was kind of self taught from there. Never ever could have imagined singing in front of everyone. I wasn’t even interested in it and grew up playing in church and stuff
CL: Yup. That hits home.
AH: The guitar was always something I felt like I could hide behind and the moment people wanted me to sing I was very thrown off by that, but then eventually just felt the pressure enough to sing. I said “Fine, I’ll sing harmonies,” and that eventually led to me kind of being in the center. Songwriting followed shortly after that. I feel like I started really writing songs in my 20s. It was during the COVID pandemic that I wrote my first album. I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life post college. I got a degree in social work but the more I did that the more I thought “I don’t know if I’m emotionally cut out for this as a job.” I took the jump and moved to Nashville in 2021 after I recorded my first album.
CL: Okay! Yeah. That’s where I first heard of you was 2021 actually was with ‘Ohio Laundry Room’
A: Oh sweet, cool!
CL: I thought ‘Oh my gosh this is really good! And then I kept following and then your album came out and I just absolutely fell in love. I love reading artist bios on Spotify, I’m a bit of a creep. I love doing it. Your Spotify bio says you really found your sound in your college years, kind of touching on what we said before. How have your college years impacted your songwriting and musicianship?
AH: I think between studying social work and starting to get burnt out on it quickly and then working a job at the same time as that, I was doing many things that had nothing to do with music. In my free time, I started to chase after that. I really fell in love with it. I am now doing music full time but when I look back to when I wasn’t doing that I think it was very special in its own way because I had such a limited amount of time to work on it. With that time, I started to prioritize that in a new way.
CL: Do you write with other people too? Are you a songwriter on the side or do you just kind of have your own thing?
AH: I, well every now and then. With my project, I mostly write by myself. I have written a couple songs with people. With this last record, besides collaborating with my producer and him having some writing credits on the record, it was me by myself. I do write for other artists.
CL: I know Nashville is a big hub of songwriting and there are a lot of songwriters, like Amy Allen, and she has her base in Nashville and in the songwriter community.
AH: There is a ton of that going on. The ‘artist vs. songwriter’ thing that I want to do is constantly evolving. When I first got to Nashville, I just dove into songwriting because it seemed like the thing that you should do when you get there. It’s an easy way to meet people, it’s kind of the equivalent of grabbing coffee.
CL: There are writing rounds in Nashville too which is so cool.
AH: Yeah, but the more I did that the more I thought ‘I don’t want to do this unless there is a purpose to it.’ I was finding that I already loved to write my music by myself so why am I putting myself in these situations where I don’t really feel like it (songwriting) is serving my music but then figuring out that I love to be a writer on other people’s projects has been something that I have realized.
CL: That is so fun! I have musical experience, I’m a pretty musical person too. My dad played trombone in high school and I picked up guitar during COVID, which has been such an outlet for me and like I said, I took piano lessons. I come from a very musical family, kind of like you.
CL: How do you get your creative juices flowing when you are making music? I love listening to my favorite artists’ Spotify playlists, the “I’m your favorite artists favorite artist” and the whole Chappell Roan type thing. That’s my gig. How do you get yourself in the mood?
AH: Hmm, That’s a good question. A lot of my gathering and inspiration has like nothing to do with actually sitting down and writing
CL: Like ‘Father of the Bride’
AH: Yeah! Yeah, meditative practices like going on a walk for example. I feel like I have written so many songs while on a walk, being away from my guitar. Something about being able to multitask in that way where it’s not distracting can be more creatively freeing for me than just saying ‘Ok sit down and write a song, don’t get up until you’ve written a song.’ I need to take breaks. That is something that I have learned over time. It’s saying “What do I need to do in order to write the best songs I can?”
CL: I am a big lyric reader and in ‘Andrea’ you say “Oh we’re going on a 22 mile walk” and I’m like ‘What?’ Is that the type of stuff you do?
AH: Not that long but very often if the weather is nice I will go on a 7 mile walk.
CL: Yeah, no I’m the same. I love going on walks and I live close to Lake Michigan so it’s perfect.
CL: I have a few niche questions but what does the line ‘I’ll be looking for a needle in a haystack but there’s horses’ mean? Like what is that metaphor? What does it mean? I know that ‘needle in a haystack’ means finding something that is really hard to find. But what is the horse element?
AH: It’s been funny hearing people’s interpretations of that. To me, it’s obvious. Many people responded to my story one day about it and they mentioned the horses are going to step on the needle. But that’s not what I meant! What I meant was, picture a farm. Why are you looking for a needle in a haystack when there’s horses? Why are you looking for this little thing when there is beauty all around you. Why are you so focused on this thing that you will probably never be able to find when there are things all around you.
C: Dang, okay. I’m sitting with that for a bit. Jeez! I’ve definitely got things in my life that are like that where you want something to be something else so bad but it’s just not. I can appreciate the beauty of the world while taking my mind off of this one thing.
CL: Were you a horse girl?
AH: No.
CL: I was.
AH: I feel like that would be kind of a vibe. I got to do a photoshoot with a horse for the record and that was awesome. I think they are gorgeous creatures.
CL: Thank you so much for explaining that metaphor. That really clears the air for me.
CL: You should work with horses more
AH: That’s my next life path
CL: What are three no-skip albums for you? Are you an album girl or a song girl?
AH: Album girl.
AH: I feel like I will mostly listen to albums. Bright Future by Adrienne Lenker, Punisher by Phoebe Bridgers, 22 A Million by Bon Iver
CL: His new album is coming out
CL & AH: I am so excited!
CL: What was your favorite song to write on the album and why?
AH: Maybe Sleeping Sculpture. I remember the process of that being fun. ‘The Price’ was fun which just happened in 30 minutes. Some of the songs on the record took months. I would just start them and I felt like I wasn’t ready to finish them. I would come back to them later. So, I feel like those two were fairly quick. They just kind of fell in my lap.
CL: Final Question: What’s your favorite piece of Steve Martin media?
AH: Cheaper by the dozen.
CL: Ok.
CL and AH burst out into laughter.