IN CONVERSATION WITH MARY LAMBERT

interview by JANA LETONJA

Multi-Platinum, GRAMMY-nominated singer, songwriter, poet, and activist Mary Lambert first captured national attention with her haunting chorus on Macklemore & Ryan Lewis’ groundbreaking marriage equality anthem ‘Same Love’, which earned two GRAMMY nominations. After nearly a decade, she returned with her boldest work yet, ‘The Tempest’. A passionate advocate for mental health and body positivity, Mary has also received honors from the Human Rights Campaign and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

‘The Tempest’ is your first major single in nearly a decade. Why did now feel like the right time to release this song? 

I have always felt that my identity and activism are intrinsic to my art, and this feels like an insane time to be making art, but I think it is also the exact perfect time to be making art. The artist Yumi Sakugawa made a post recently that said “Living is the ultimate creative act and art is one of many creations that can arise from it when we are intentional about disrupting oppressive patterns in order to generate liberatory ones,” and it spoke to me so intensely. I’ve re-read it many times, honestly. I think most artists are empathic, and when you belong to a destructive and genocidal state, how can you not be broken open every day? I wrote ‘The Tempest’ because I was angry and I released it because I am angry. And my anger reminds me that I am human and that I refuse to be passive during times of injustice.  

You’ve described the song as a battlecry. What emotions or events inspired the righteous anger that fuels the track?

I wrote this song after Roe v. Wade was overturned and abortion care became a criminal offense in many states. All of this is happening at the same time as the rights for trans people are being eliminated, as ICE is kidnapping and killing people in detention centers, as Gaza is systematically being starved. Bodily autonomy should be a human right. And we should all be pissed off as hell that any state would interfere with an individual’s right to survive. 

How did Shakespeare’s original text influence the songwriting process? What parallels did you see between ‘The Tempest’ and today’s world? 

I like ‘The Tempest’ a lot. I took a mini Shakespeare course a few years ago and loved it. I planned on writing an album focused on the lesser known characters in Shakespeare, but it became a little too myopic and more of a chore, so ‘The Tempest’ is on its own. I think there are so many parallels between the play and our world today. Prospero, like Trump, thinks he can do anything he wants, that he can enslave the inhabitants of the island and extract anything for his gain. Prospero eventually learns his lesson, but I’m not so sure that will happen in our world, so I guess I would consider this an anthem for Ariel and Caliban.

You self-produced ‘The Tempest’. What was that learning process like, and how did it influence your creative control?

I’ve actually been producing for a while now. I produced my entire last record, ‘Grief Creature,’ and I’ve produced for a few other artists, like Hollis. Being a creative producer is natural, I think for most artists, but the tougher side, at least for me, was learning my way around the gear and the audio engineering side of things. I got the opportunity to compose the music for a film called ‘1946: The Mistranslation That Shifted Culture’, and I had to learn pretty quickly how to compose to picture, which required a lot of the tools that a producer or engineer would use. It was an exciting challenge, and learning how to produce has definitely opened a whole new world of creative expression to me. 

You’ve always been a fierce advocate for LGBTQ+ rights and bodily autonomy. How do you balance art and activism in your music?

For me, they are one and the same. I write about what I’m feeling, what I notice. If you are connected and you pay attention, how can you not write and create about what you are seeing, even the dark parts? I think it’s more complicated to write from that place, but I think that’s where all the interesting stuff is. 

What does liberation mean to you today, and how is that reflected in this new chapter of your career?

In this phase of my life, I’m not interested in liberation unless it’s collective liberation. I think it’s boring to be exclusionary. I think, in regards to music and this next record, that has really translated to “I might not be for everybody” and I’m okay with that. For so much of my life, being liked by everyone felt like life or death, and it feels really liberating to not be in that same frame of mind anymore.

You skyrocketed to fame with ‘Same Love’ in collaboration with Mackelmore & Ryan Lewis. Looking back now, how do you see that moment shaping your musical path?

‘Same Love’ was one of the most gratifying, instructive, whirlwind experiences an artist could ever have, and one of the most powerful aspects of it was that Macklemore and Ryan were independent. There was no record label, so it was inspiring to see a successful artist remain independent. I also got to witness firsthand that the message does not have to suffer in pursuit of record sales. You can be committed to a cause for social justice and make a really good song at the same time.

Your third studio album is on the horizon. What can fans expect sonically and thematically?

At the core of this album is just quality songwriting. I co-wrote some songs with Sera Cahoone, but I mostly just hunkered down in my studio and fine-tuned songs, songs I’ve been mulling over for at least a decade, a few that I wrote a couple years back, and then had a bunch hit me like lightning over the last year. I just really wanted the songs to speak for themselves and stand alone. I’m in the fun, experimental part of my album process, which is playing with production and how everything will tie together. 

Will ‘The Tempest’ set the tone for the entire album, or are you exploring other emotional and stylistic landscapes too?

‘The Tempest’ is definitely a vibe I love, and there are elements on the record of a no-holds-barred, give-no-fucks energy, but ‘The Tempest’ is what I would call one extreme of production in terms of its polishing in comparison to the rest of the tracks. The rest of the album is definitely more intimate production wise, and there are definitely some soft and sweet moments, but the intensity and lyricism is still a through line.

What message or feeling do you hope listeners take away from this next phase of your work?

I hope listeners feel validated in their own quest for autonomy. I hope it offers an invitation for people, especially queer folks and women, to embrace their rage and their grief and also believe that something more beautiful and possible and bright is waiting on the other side of the patriarchal empire.

CREDITS

photography KIM SELLING