INTERVIEW: Chase Zera on her latest single 'Bring Me Down': "Sometimes you just want to tune out all the advice and trust your own instincts"
Interview: Jett Tattersall
Chase Zera (full name Ebony Morrison) launched her music career last year with a run of three sublime electro-synth-pop singles which saw her achieve over half a million streams backed up by performances at festivals across the country including Curve Ball, Wine Machine and NYE In The Park.
Earlier this month she released her first new music of 2020 with the killer track ‘Bring Me Down’, another lushly produced slice of electro-synth which masterfully slides from chilled out, trancey vibes to hedonistic dancefloor beats. Topping it off is Zera’s rich, soulful vocal which wraps itself around deliciously up front, no bars hold lyrics such as "I could say what doesn't kill me makes me write sad songs. But what for?”
‘Bring Me Down is the first of four planned singles from Chase Zera this year, and we recently spoke to her to find out more.
Hello Chase! Thank you so much for your time today. How are things with you?
Really good actually. It’s been a while since I released a song, the last song was in August last year. I really knuckled down and have been writing a lot of music and really thinking about what I want to write about. I just feel like releasing this song this month has had a huge weight off my shoulders because all of this that I've been working on in the confined space of my room or a studio is now out in the world and I can actually celebrate and talk to people about it and stuff. It's a really nice feeling. It's like therapy releasing songs in some ways.
It is one hell of a track, so congratulations on ‘Bring Me Down’. I'm loving those clicks and then they pour into your kind of whiskey bar vocals. It’s so good.
I actually recorded those vocals on the very first session and I was recording with the intention of them being demo vocals. I was like ‘let’s just get this idea down and then we can come back and do them’, but I think because I wasn't trying too hard I actually recorded them with the emotion that I wanted the outcome to be. Sometimes if you're not trying too hard, the vocals turn out the way you want them to be and when you’re trying too hard it sounds like you're reading them off an autocue or something. It was cool how that came about pretty quickly.
Can you tell me the story behind this track?
I was going through this phase of post break up, in that phase where every time you meet up with a friend and you talk about what you're going through they're going to give different advice and this and that. Everyone can relate to advice from people and them sending you quotes that have helped you through things. It's all so helpful. But sometimes you also just want to tune all of that out and trust your own instincts and go ‘actually I know the way that I need to get through this’, whether it is a break-up or something you’re going through with family or grieving or stress. Whatever it is you know the best way that you can get through things. So I decided I was going to write a song about those times in your life where you feel like you want to make a choice or you want to take a chance, you know? You want to take this career path. people might be telling you a bunch of different things but you should really trust your own instincts and if you think you should do something, just go for it. I was in the mood a few days before this session. I was driving in the car on the way there thinking of different phrases, like writing the lyrics on my drive to the studio almost because I was just so excited about it. Because I felt so passionate about writing a song about that, it flowed really easily. I had that feeling for everyone who has made a tough decision or followed a dream or gotten through something and it might have gone against conventional advice - good on them and they should keep doing that. So that was kind of the thought process behind the lyrics.
‘Said I Would’ which you released last year was that irresistible hit and I must say it's my favourite. You've got that build up to the drop. It's just another level of perfection. But then you went and released this gorgeous… very beautifully raw almost R&B ‘Mess’ in May last year. It was a real step away from those floor fillers that your listeners associate with you. I just wanted to know as producer, song writer, one-woman powerhouse, how important is it for you to push those boundaries of expectation and genres when it comes to your music?
I think it's so important and the reason why is because it's unrealistic to think that someone will be in the same headspace for every song that they write. You know? If you're feeling sad and you want to write about that, then write about it. If you're feeling nostalgic, if you're in a happy mood, write about that. Lady Gage is a great example. She has ‘Speechless’ and those beautiful ballad songs and she's got ‘Born This Way’ and it shows the entire spectrum of her thought process and her personality and what she's gone through. I love writing about confidence and empowerment and I've enjoyed writing those songs, but I think it's also good to strip it back and be real when I'm not feeling so confident because then people can see ‘she's been through this and she's come out of it’. It shows the whole curve of what you've gone through. ‘Mess’ was a real vulnerable moment for me and I felt a lot of people are probably feeling this way as well. So I owe it to them to say ‘yeah I feel like that too’. It's almost this beautiful feeling of once I release this people can know that we're all going through the same thing and we're all just human. It's good to write about whatever you’re feeling at the time. Not trying to force a happy song if you’re not feeling happy and not trying to force a sad song for the purpose of having a ballad if you're not feeling sad.
That's true. You can't force a ballad. That should be on a bumper sticker.
My friend who's studying psychology, she calls it a vulnerability hangover and I love that term. When you release a song and it's really vulnerable and you're like ‘is the person I'm writing this about going to be offended or know it's about them or have I gone too deep?’ But I think it's always better to make honest art and go through that than to not release it at all.
I love it. Now you have been dancing incredibly well from the young age of 6, and are now a fully-fledged pop artist. It’s clear music charges you in a multitude of ways. Can you talk me through your years of growing up and particularly your exposure to music and how it affected you as the artist you are today?
From a young age, if I'm passionate about something I go all in on it. I was a gymnast for the first 14 years of my life and that was my entire life. I travelled doing that and everything. But when you're so used to that being your routine., when you stop doing it you can't just do nothing. I needed to replace it with a new passion. I always need to have an ambition. So that's when I went into dancing and I released it was similar to gymnastics but less pressure and more creative and more fun. I knew from then that that is what i wanted to do. I was always dancing to Kylie Minogue, Lady Gaga, Sophie Ellis Bexter, Jamiroquai from 6 when I was doing jazz class all the way up to when I was older and doing 4 or 5 days of dancing a week. I was exposed to music. A lot of artists say ‘performing is kind of daunting to me’ or ‘i love being in the studio but I don't love performing’ and I actually came at it from the other angle where I've always known I wanted to perform because that what's make me happy and that's my therapy being on stage and performing and letting it out. But I didn't know whether it was going to be as a dancer or as a singer or as an actor. I just sort of tried all of it. It's interesting that music was the thing that as soon as I started it, I knew that's what it would be.
Before the 2020 global collapse train wreck, your live shows were notoriously high energy and equally visually candy shopped to match the tunes as you showcase this kind of kick arse choreography alongside your dancers. I just want to know what is it about those live shows that you just love?
I love the planning as much as doing them. Once I have the song written I'm like ‘boom, we need to choreography a dance to this now’. If I have a live show planned around the songs that I make, then it's the whole package. For me, finishing a song isn't a done deal - it’s once I then choreograph a dance to it, turn it into a live show. I love performing and I love dancing on stage with the girls and I love watching people dance to my music because that's been a huge goal of mine. My mantra is I want to make music that people can dance to. I want to make music that makes people happy.
If you were to look back in time to your own adolescence based on the gym mat and the dance floor, are you making the music now that you needed to shake your arse too or do a handspring to back in the day?
When I started off, because I've got quite a bluesy tone to my voice, I was writing more ballads. Downtempo music. As much as I loved it, i was like ‘no, I want to be a pop artist and be able to dance on stage and have this really energetic show to look forward to running out and doing’. With that music, I just felt like it wouldn't feel like myself to go out and stand on a stage and sing songs without having energy and dancing to them. So that's when I sort of changed my thought process to ‘we’re going to make dance songs, it doesn't matter if the lyrics are positive or negative, it can be whatever you’re going through’. I always want that dance ability behind it.
As a solo artist, what have you found are the pressures of it being all on you with regards to just doing it alone and what are the motivators that keep you going through it?
In terms of motivation, I try not to compare myself to anyone. I watch a lot of Ted talks and a lot of interviews with artists and I think a lot of successful people, what they have in common is that they really believe they're in their own lane and if they have a passion or a purpose it's for a reason. I feel like if I am this passionate about music and dance and performing and what I do, then setbacks aren't going to make me stop doing it. I've always had that mentality. It can get hard when a lot of people are doing the same thing or you get setbacks but I've never let any of that stop me from creating it. I'm lucky enough to have a team around me and they're amazing, but I'm also glad that I had those two releases of doing it on my own because I really built up that self-esteem and self-confidence and did it on my own before I got to this point. I feel like I am independent and can really do it because I went through some hardship in the beginning. Keep pushing on and just believing in yourself is going to make other people believe in you. Because as soon as I started confidently saying ‘I'm an artist’ instead of ‘it’s just a hobby;, that's what made other people believe in me and join my team. I think that’s really important.
The dance music scene, as with the rock music scene and all music scenes, is notoriously a boys’ club, particularly when it comes to production and song writing which you're kicking arse at yourself. Do you ever find that you're having to push yourself even harder to be heard, or have you found it quite a level playing field?
I think that I'm in a lucky time where people are a lot more aware of it and aware of being held accountable for their actions. A lot of the males that I work with, like Xavier Dunn who I produce with regularly, they'll take my ideas on board and they do let me have a voice and that's been amazing. What I've experienced is a man can be a DJ and people just assume that he's a producer, whereas women could release five songs and they are produced by them [but people] still doubt that they're a producer. It's that mentality of men are trusted with their word and women have to prove themselves. I still get in sessions and it says everywhere that I can produce and people say ‘so do you produce? Or I'll release a song like ‘Mess’ and people almost met the song with shock that I produced it on my own. It can be offensive because how many times do I need to say this and show it in sessions and show it in my songs before people believe that I do it? Whereas for males everyone just believes that they can do it from the get-go. That's what I've found a bit tough. Women need to take that extra step to keep proving that we can do something instead of people just having faith in the fact that if we say we can do it, we can do it.
Yeah, it's this global assumption. Chase, lastly, what is on the horizon for you this year?
Well, I have a few more songs coming out this year, they're going to be quite steady throughout the year. I'm very excited about that. A lot of writing, I've got some collaborative writing sessions coming up that I'm really excited about and also hopefully when things start to pick up again I'll be planning a new live show and getting back into that. I'm just going to be writing and making music until I get the green light that we can perform again and then it'll be back into singing on the treadmill and getting back into shape so I can perform again!
‘Bring Me Down’ by Chase Zera is out now via Warner Music. You can download and stream by clicking here.
To keep up with all things Chase Zera you can follow her on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
