California indie folk artist, Lindsay White, has spent years translating her emotions into lyrics. Today, she’s looking to add to her repertoire, creating more music that provokes in-depth thought.
For over 10 years now, White has been producing music. She states, “It sort of has just inched along over the last decade or more. I started out by doing open mics and eventually built up to doing bigger shows and got connected with a producer who produced my first album.” This album came to be Tracks, which was released back in 2010.
Soon after the release of Tracks, White discovered a whole new side of music by pairing up with Veronica May and becoming one half of the duo, The Lovebirds. With the niche nature of the duo, they had quite the run. “They (supporters) were interested in the fact that it was a lesbian duo and we sing harmonies. So there was something to latch on to,” White says.
However, becoming part of The Lovebirds brought on its own set of challenges for the duo. For one, White herself was just coming to terms with her own sexuality. The music of the time reflected her journey working through a divorce while also discovering her feelings towards May; not only her group member but romantic partner at the time.
In addition to that stress, in July of 2011, May was hospitalized for a short period of time. This ultimately, overtime led to the slow downfall of The LoveBirds. However, through The LoveBirds load of different emotions, changes, and challenges, White was able to carry those feelings into her lyricism, driving her music to an even deeper level of relatability and power.
Lyricism has always been the staple of her music, regardless of whether she has been performing solo or with a duo. She says, “The music, kind of has been all over the place from like folk, country, blues, rock, or pop or whatever I’m feeling at the moment, but the lyrics are always the thing dominating for me.”
In fact, her most recent album, Lights Out, released in 2017, has received quite a bit of attention from the press for its powerful lyrics. Media such as Pop Magazine, The Bluegrass Situation, Atwood Magazine, After Ellen, and much more, latched onto the album. They refer to the album as “musical therapy”, “harrowingly intimate”, and a “meditation on emotional losses”. For White, the album is all about the feeling of grief.
During the time Lights Out was being written, White lost a great deal of family, including her grandfather and mother. Although the losses brought conflicting feelings, she was able to come to semi-peaceful terms with grief. “I think people like to avoid the topic of death and dying because it’s scary, but honestly I think if we talked about it more, we could kind of come together as a society and base all our actions in compassion and understanding and kind of get over the hate,” she states.
She continues, “I hope that writing music about these topics, and traveling and talking to people about these topics helps people get those thoughts going.”
