Today we’d like to introduce you to Liska Steele.
Liska, we’d love to hear your story and how you got to where you are today both personally and as an artist.
I sort of grew up in music studios because my dad is a music producer who used to compose music for commercials. We even had a make-shift studio in our basement so there was always some sort of music playing in the background at home. Like literally always to an annoying extent. It definitely shaped my perception of music as a form of creation and made me probably a little bit cynical as the exposure allowed me to see through the smoke and mirrors that are ever so present in the music industry. I was a fairly jaded child and lacked the perspective most people I knew had about music, I just didn’t understand what the “big deal” was. I think the first song I ever recorded was a Christmas song I learned in third grade that my parents decided to record and send out as a Christmas card.
I was also in an imaginary girl group called the “We Go Girls” consisting of my sister, her friend and me. My dad would make these tracks for us and go “ok, sing this like Rihanna” and it was super fun and innocent and pointless. Once I went to high school, however, I started to realize how lucky I was to have studio access and began to write a lot more and started experimenting with programs like Reason and Pro Tools. I recorded a ton of songs with my dad during such a transformative stage of my life and it allowed me to acquire a very mutable approach to songwriting. I still often find myself wanting to genre hop because of it. Basically, what I’m trying to say is I’ve been writing and recording music since I can remember and the only difference between my life as an artist then and my life as an artist now is the fact that I’ve recently started playing live shows. Oh, and I shot a music video.
We’d love to hear more about your art. What do you do you do and why and what do you hope others will take away from your work?
I make pop music. Like straight up bubble gum pop and I record everything in my basement. When I’m writing a song sometimes I’ll hear the music in head first and then put together a very basic, poorly made instrumental track just so I could lay some vocals down and then I’ll send the track to my dad. My dad is the person who makes everything sound, like, too good. I cannot even comprehend how talented my dad is. Other times he’ll send me a track he made along with a vague vision he has for the song and I’ll build the vocals and melody from there. I just have so much fun writing songs that are cheesy and over the top and maybe a little cliché because for the most part that is the type of music I listen to. I feel a rush of excitement when I listen to my favorite pop songs and I want my own songs to invoke the same feeling for people who listen to them. I just want everyone to be having fun all the time, even when they’re sad, and that’s only possible within the fantastical realm of pop music.
Do current events, local or global, affect your work and what you are focused on?
I definitely think the role of artists has changed substantially considering we have much easier access to their work as well as deeper insight into their daily lives through the internet and social media. I feel we often look to popular artists for validation of our views making art feel even more politically charged than it might have been before information was so readily available. You can look at Kanye of an example of an artist who has strange political power seeing as we suddenly saw an influx of people who wouldn’t generally be a Kanye “fan” preaching his greatness, while many diehard fans were left heartbroken and confused.
I think most people expect their favorite artists to be up to date on current events at least on a national level because when you do have a platform of people who value what you have to say, there is an expectation that you will use it to speak up on issues that need to be brought to light as well as lend support to those who may be silently suffering, and there are a lot of artists doing this through both their virtual personas and their work. I do find myself writing songs as a way to cope with all of the horrific things happening in America and around the world. There’s also so much fucked up shit happening in Chicago specifically, it’s just heartbreaking and it feels like nobody’s willing to listen to the people who are finding the courage to speak up. I see art as an opportunity to lend compassion, encourage empowerment and be truthful and I hope the music I create is reflective of that.
Do you have any events or exhibitions coming up? Where would one go to see more of your work? How can people support you and your artwork?
I just released a music video for my single “All My Dealers” which can be found here:
You can find out about show announcements and new projects by “Liking” me on Facebook and following me on Instagram (@Liskasteele) and follow me on Spotify to listen to my latest music
Contact Info:
- Website: https://open.spotify.com/artist/2xy71KSb07RfjbEaQ8peYp
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/liskasteele/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/liskasteele/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/Liskasteele
- Other: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZyHPVXAIw0
Image Credit:
Abbi Chase and Cara Givens.
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