Sophie Meiers is an 18-year-old making music in her bedroom in Durango, a small city in southwestern Colorado, but she's already connecting with people all over the world. It's a story we're hearing more and more—if you have the drive, the passion, and an internet connection, you can connect with fellow creatives and build a fan base, even though you may feel stuck in the middle of nowhere.
Sophie is racking up millions of plays online with genre-spanning songs and her collaborative spirit is clear from one look at her SoundCloud page. "If you listen to my discography you will notice that I have many songs that branch across a huge spectrum of genres: hip-hop, R&B, electronic, jazz, indie, and more," she tells us. "One thing about me as an artist is that I am so obsessed with music as a listener that I am always inspired to try new things and constantly experiment with my 'sound.' Through collaborating with so many other people I am always pushed out of my comfort zone, resulting in hybrid genres and sounds that I am really unsure of how to categorize."
One thread that does runs through Sophie Meiers' music is her personality—the songs feel honest and authentic, and the lyrics often touch on relatable emotions. "Fade Away," a collaboration with Lil Peep producer Lederrick, co-produced by Holt Stairs, is another such song, and it's premiering below.
"It's a bittersweet confessional about isolation and my relationship with feeling impermanent," Sophie explains. "It embodies some of my dissociative tendencies and discusses how life can sometimes be robotic and numb. It also comments on how although sometimes I can get sucked up into the emotionless void, I am alive, and I'm not afraid. 'As long as my heart's still beating I'm okay' is a mantra that I tell myself when shit gets rough. I remind myself that life doesn't have to be perfect or beautiful all the time, I just have to keep going."
Listen to "Fade Away" now and read the interview below to get to know this young artist with an incredibly bright future.
Who are you and what can you share about yourself?
I'm an artist, musician, graphic designer, producer, writer, poet, philosopher, cosmic alchemist, and music junkie. I've always been an extremely curious child, I get easily obsessed with interesting topics and I have had a long list of "things I wanted to be when I grew up" throughout the years. Including (but not limited to) being a neurosurgeon, psychologist, interior designer, journalist, author, actor, etc. I'm 18 now, I graduated high school last may, and since then I have been pursuing music and art full time. Creation is such a huge part of how I process my experiences and emotions. I think it is profound that anyone is able to take such vivid stories and immortalize them forever through art and music.
I think I am slightly obsessed with trying to document and preserve all of my feelings and memories, humans have this innate urge to want to be remembered, it makes us feel more important in the grand scheme of existence. So this is me trying to immortalize myself and my feelings so I don't fade away into oblivion. (lol)
What's your hometown like and how has it impacted you as a person and musician? I heard that it's in a remote part of Colorado so I imagine maybe there isn't that much of a music scene?
My hometown is in the middle of nowhere, it's very isolated, and there were many times growing up where I felt like I was trapped in a fishbowl. I always felt out of place, I didn’t really fit into a specific group—I kinda drifted from scene to scene because there were parts of me that fit in anywhere and parts of me that never fit in anywhere. The first two years of high school were really rough for me, I was skipping school all the time, getting in with the "wrong crowd," making bad decisions, and overall just being a degenerate.
Something inside me snapped after sophomore year and I completely changed everything about my life. I switched schools, I stopped hanging out with my friend group, and kinda dropped off the face of the earth. That’s when I really started isolating and spending pretty much all of my time on self-reflecting, growing as a person and an artist, and working my ass off. I would sit in school at the back of class making beats on my laptop all day. There isn't really much of a music scene in my hometown, aside from the same dude busking the same blues songs on main street all day. There are a couple coffee shops and bar type venues but that’s about it. No hate against Durango, it's absolutely gorgeous, it just isn't really the place where being a freelance artist and pursuing music is accepted and encouraged.
How long have you been making music? What inspired you to start?
I've been making music for as long as I can remember. It's interesting, I get asked this question quite a bit, and there wasn't really a clear "AHA" moment where I decided that’s what I wanted to do. It's just something that has been deeply entrenched in how I describe and perceive the world. I've been writing songs since before first grade, which seems kinda insane now that I look back at it. One thing that really pushed my obsession for singing was watching The Sound Of Music when I was a little girl. I loved it so much and ended up memorizing and performing every number to my stuffed animals. The first song I really learned to sing was "My Favorite Things." From there it escalated to begging my family to let me get a piano and a guitar, and I would sit there for hours pressing the keys until I found something I thought sounded nice. I taught myself how to play by ear, and then I would just write chord progressions and songs for fun whenever I could. And now, here I am.
What does "Fade Away" mean to you? What do you want listeners to take from it?
"Fade Away" is a bittersweet confessional about isolation and my relationship with feeling impermanent. It embodies some of my dissociative tendencies and discusses how life can sometimes be robotic and numb. It also comments on how although sometimes I can get sucked up into the emotionless void, I am alive, and I'm not afraid. "As long as my heart's still beating I'm okay" is a mantra that I tell myself when shit gets rough. I remind myself that life doesn't have to be perfect or beautiful all the time, I just have to keep going. I want listeners to be able to put words to some of these existential thoughts and feelings that we all experience from time to time, but also know that they can keep going, life is imperfect and fucked up. As long as your heart is still beating, it's okay.
Who is Lederrick and how did you connect with him for this track?
Lederrick is a producer who has made some really wonderful music and worked with some of my favorite artists. His songs with Lil Peep are as heartbreaking as they are powerful. He has produced on "Crybaby," "Your Favorite Dress," "Suck My Blood," "Ghost Girl," "Teen Romance," and much more. He told me that his music sounds and moves fluidly like waves, and water. He actually reached out to me on Twitter, and then he ended up DMing me about working on some songs together and I guess the rest is history.
You Tweeted about the power of the Internet to forge relationships and connect with artists. Can you expand on that a little bit? How has the internet helped you as a creative?
YES absolutely I would love to expand, this is one of my favorite things to talk about. I have met so many of my best friends through the internet: specifically SoundCloud. Back when I had like 200 followers I was in this group chat with a bunch of SoundCloud geeks and over the past two years or so I have been able to watch all of us grow exponentially and go from little kids in our basements making music for fun to actually being able to meet each other and play shows and slowly see all of our influences leak into the mainstream music and media.
It's been so f*king beautiful to be a part of this community, and watch how all of our own unique styles mix together and create these incredibly interesting and unique new waves. We are all in it together, and we are bringing each other up in ways that I could have never foreseen. It makes me get all teary-eyed because honestly, my friends are the coolest most talented people EVER. So wild that most of the music I listen to is made by my homies. Or even to think that people I listened to YEARS ago and idolized are now my FRIENDS that I talk to casually. It's completely insane to me, and I'm so grateful to be where I am now. It would be stupid of me to be on some dumb ego trip that I did it all myself, I would not be anywhere without everyone who helped me and encouraged me and influenced me along the way.
People have been talking more and more about this bedroom pop scene recently—is that something you feel part of? What do you think about that description?
I do identify with the bedroom pop scene, mainly in the sense that all of my music is recorded and created in my closet or bedroom! Although I feel like I am a part of it, I don’t really identify as a "bedroom pop artist" just like I don't identify with being a "lo-fi artist" or an "indie artist." If you listen to my discography you will notice that I have many songs that branch across a huge spectrum of genres: hip-hop, r&b, electronic, jazz, indie, and more. One thing about me as an artist is that I am so obsessed with music as a listener that I am always inspired to try new things and constantly experiment with my "sound." Through collaborating with so many other people I am always pushed out of my comfort zone, resulting in hybrid genres and sounds that I am really unsure of how to categorize. I just love too many different types of music to be put into one box.
Are you focusing on music full time right now?
Absolutely, music and art get 100% of my time and energy currently. I have been focusing on refining my production skills, learning jazz guitar, practicing piano, graphic art, teaching myself C4D, writing poetry and working on some zines, designing some fashion stuff, and many other weird conceptual visual projects.
Are you an independent artist right now? Is signing something that's of interest to you and why or why not?
I'm currently an independent artist. I really like being able to have my own creative control and freedom with my art. I have always valued being able to make what I want, when I want, how I want to. I'm not opposed to signing, especially with someone who understands and respects my creative vision, and is onboard with who I am and what I want to create. I guess it just depends on what they are willing to offer me and how they can grow my ideas and dreams. I don't like the idea of being a cookie cutter mold of what makes the most profit. My music is very special and intimate to me, and I don't ever want to water myself down because it's not whats marketable.
When did you start performing live and is that something you enjoy?
I started performing live at a really young age, I was in a jazz/blues/funk/rock band called "SUPERBAD" in middle school/high school and we played a lot of local gigs and events around my hometown. I've always loved performing, I love dressing up, I love live music, and I love being able to interact with the people who come to see the show. It's such an enthralling and rewarding experience for me. I've been doing lots of solo shows recently which has been extremely fun but I really want to set up a live band in the near future.
What else have you got planned for this year?
MY FIRST OFFICIAL EP IS COMING OUT AROUND AUGUST/SEPTEMBER!!!! I'm sooooooo excited (this song is not from that EP, just to be clear). I am also working hard on a different self-produced EP under my alias "guttergirl." Lots of collaborations and music coming out very soon. Also expect tons of merch, zines, cassettes and vinyls of my existing songs, music videos, lots of shows, possibly a tour??? I'm moving out to LA this summer which is really exciting. I also really want to do a couple art gallery exhibitions of some of my visual artwork, and I would love to do some modeling and acting as well. So many exciting things coming that I can't wait to reveal.
Anything else you want to add or you want people to know?
Check out my side account where I post my own production! It's really fun and great and I have lots of releases coming out for guttergirl. Listen here.
See Sophie Meiers live:
MAY 27TH @ WEBER RATIONS, LOS ANGELES WITH HARRY TEARDROP, FOLIAGE, AND SLATER
JUNE 8TH @ 1720, LOS ANGELES WITH MICHAEL SEYER, AOLANI, AND A SPECIAL GUEST
