English singer-songwriter Suki Waterhouse sat down with WERS writer Rebecca Sampson in anticipation of both Suki’s upcoming show in Boston and WERS 88.9 FM’s 75th birthday. Here is what Suki had to say about touring, style, and more!
How would you describe your music to someone who hasn’t heard it yet? Are there any particular themes or messages you hope to convey through your music?
Wow, that’s a great question. I think there are themes of trying to reconcile with my own self-destructiveness and metamorphosis as I’ve gone from girlhood into womanhood. The narrative of my life is woven through there as I gain new perspectives, and it’s this kind of tapestry that keeps unfurling.
So it’s very personal to your experiences and your life.
Yeah, so far so personal.
How has the Sparklemuffin tour been going so far? What has been the highlight of the experience for you?
The highlight experience so far on the Sparklemuffin tour was definitely the Greek Theatre in LA, because I live right next to that theater. To have my music and my songs reverberating off the canyons and around where I’ve spent the last decade- it was one of those very strange moments where I thought about coming to LA a decade ago, and how far away the idea of performing at The Greek was. You know, everyone says that the LA crowds suck, that the shows aren’t good in LA, but people were up on their feet and the energy felt so positive. I felt so unbelievably blessed for that experience. It’s such a nightmare to get to the Greek, with parking and everything, I couldn’t even believe that many people showed up. It made my heart feel very full.
You’ve had the chance to perform in a variety of cities-has any location stood out to you?
The Warfield Theatre in San Francisco was very beautiful. Obviously, I’m excited for the Ryman in Nashville, too. I’m excited to play the new venue in New York, the Brooklyn Paramount, I’ve heard that’s an incredibly stunning place, as well. Shows always take you by surprise- the Moody Theatre in Austin was also one of my favorite shows. I don’t know much about mechanics, but the venue was built for sound.
Good acoustics.
Yeah, the acoustics, the sound, and wow, it really does make such an unbelievable difference. So, that show really stuck out to me as well.
Can you tell us about the inspiration behind the name Memoir of a Sparklemuffin?
I started with the word ‘memoir’ because I felt disconnected. There were certain periods of my life with big gaps I blocked out because I didn’t want to remember who I was at the time; where I was embarrassed or cringed to remember myself in those moments. It was this exercise to have all the parts of myself be part of one story instead of always bifurcating them into different sections in my mind, erasing ceratin parts. I started writing my own memoir outside of music, going into slightly more painful things I wanted to forget. I wanted to be friends with every part of myself. I love reading memoirs- I’m so attracted to knowing all the dirty details of someone else’s life. That’s what I wanted to do with this record, have mine on display too. There were certain books I read, too; Liz Phair’s memoir stuck out to me when I was making this record. There were lessons she taught me in that book, and I feel like if those situations ever come up in my life, I’ll have Liz’s voice in my head now. The Sparklemuffin is this sort of cannibalizing, Bob Fosse dancing spider that I found late one night, and there was something about the name and the randomness of the spider: it’s cute and fuzzy, but also a self-destructive cannibal. The way it dances for its life to attract its mate, I resonated with that and with the idea of trying not to get eaten.
Can you talk about the creative process behind your music? Do you have a specific writing or recording routine?
So much of making music is daydreaming. With this record, I found my old YouTube account with all the playlists I used to make and all the videos I was interested in. I had such great taste when I was 17 and 18, such interest in finding obscure things that spoke to me. So, there’s that part of searching for golden nuggets and writing my own memoir. Then there’s the really grueling and annoying part- you just have to force yourself to book a studio and say “I’m doing four days in a row of ten-hour days and this is the only thing I’m doing.” It’s the horrible, uncomfortable part of locking yourself away, and that’s why you need community. Sometimes you have to deal with the fact that you might not come up with anything for ten hours and feel like you wasted the day. But it’s not a waste, because the next day you’re closer to something, or even if that whole week is a dud, you know to go in the other direction next week. A lot of it is the discipline element of it, you have to break through all those painful things. You’re gonna try and procrastinate, and you will procrastinate, and your brain will sometimes do what it can to not do the thing because it’s a looming, terrifying venture, making a record. Like making anything, it’s like “ugh, can I not?”
I admire your dedication to fashion – furs, patterns, movement, heavy drapes, dramatic silhouettes – what inspires your personal style?
Yeah, everything you just said is what I’ve been wanting to have on stage. I want to have accents, bits of fur and texture and depth. Especially on stage, large draping sleeves convey a visual language of expansiveness and drama. From working in fashion for a long time, I can look at something quickly and know whether or not it’ll be an extension of the music, which I’m always looking for on stage. On the Sparklemuffin tour especially, I’ve had some gigantic, baroque-looking coats- it’s like being a Sparkelmuffin queen. It’s a hugely important part of the visual language, which extends to my musical world. It’s very fun to me; because I spent a long time working in fashion before doing music, I have a relationship to picking clothes and knowing what I like and don’t like.
Which decade of fashion would you go back to?
Definitely the 70s. I love intricate, vintage pieces from the 70s. Pieces that feel incredibly delicate appeal to me as well. I love vintage lace and quilty, witchy jackets.
As someone who’s worked in multiple creative fields, such as fashion, TV/Film (Daisy Jones and the Six just recently came out), and music, how do you balance all of your passions? Do you ever feel like one area takes precedence over the others?
It’s basically impossible. With all these things I love doing, it’s hard to balance. One thing will always take precedence over the others at certain points. With something like Daisy Jones and the Six, that’s your life for a year and it’s everything you’re thinking about. But it fuels the other thing. If I’m involved in a movie or TV show for a long period of time, the experience will always fuel something else. Doing that show, playing Karen, who is very assertive; there’s got to be a reason why afterwards, I suddenly made a record for the first time. I had only ever put out singles and wasn’t quite ready to go for it. But you never know how something will fuel something else you do. It could be a friendship or anything, even a dinner. You never know how your life is gonna be changed by something.
Looking ahead, is there a particular project or dream role that you haven’t yet pursued but would love to in the future?
I would love to play Dusty Springfield. She was from a place called Margate in England and I’ve always been so fascinated by her life story and in love with the songs. I’m trying to work on it and make it happen.
