Canadian singer/songwriter Alexis Lynn is sitting down with HOLR to discuss her love of storytelling and the power of pop music.
Alexis Lynn is taking the pop music industry by storm with her catchy yet honest tracks that confidently tackle her life experiences and encourage others to live their own truth. Her latest sophomore album release titled, Real Talk, centers on mental health as one struggles with unhealthy coping mechanisms, eventually coming out on the other side to accept the duality of healing.
Today, Alexis Lynn is sitting down with HOLR to chat about this new chapter in her career by sharing her story in hopes of bringing comfort and solidarity to her listeners.
Talk to us about how you got your start in the music industry.
I’ve always been singing since I was a kid. I love singing and my family was always really supportive of what my sibling and I were interested in. I begged my parents to put me in singing lessons when I was young. I then started singing and performing. When I was 16, I started taking piano lessons and writing songs.
This is when it really shifted for me, in terms of wanting to be an artist. I had stories to tell and something to say. I started writing songs and releasing music around 2019, and it’s gone from there!
Where does the inspiration behind your music come from- we’ve heard that some of your favourite artists include Rihanna and Amy Winehouse.
For me, I’ve always taken inspiration from my life and the people around me. One of my all-time favourite artists is Amy Winehouse. Not only is her voice iconic, but her songwriting is really inspiring to me. She was always an artist that was unabashedly authentic and her writing really showed that. It was conversational, deep, and introspective. She didn’t care what people thought. Same with Rihanna- she’s so cool!
When I grew up seeing Amy Winehouse and hearing her music, I thought, “this is the kind of artist I want to be!” I want to be someone who also tells stories and writes them in a conversational, relatable and introspective way. I want to make people feel seen, since her music was so inspirational for me. She was instrumental in shaping the type of artist I wanted to be.
You’ve dedicated your passion for music to developing authentic, raw stories with your lyrics, offering an introspective glimpse into your world as a bisexual woman, feminist, and mental health advocate. Tell us more about this.
For me, songwriting started as something that was really therapeutic. I’ve always struggled with vulnerability. To have this as an expressive outlet that allowed me to talk about things and content inside my head was really therapeutic for me. It also turned into me asking myself what kind of artist I wanted to be and what kind of stories I wanted to tell.
Some of my favourite music are songs that made me feel so seen. I always wanted to be a songwriter and an artist who hopefully does that for other people. I think there are a lot of hard conversations that we don’t always necessarily want to talk about, but I think hearing it in music gives you that buffer. When you listen to it and hear those words, you think” I’ve been there and I felt this,” so it can be really healing for people. It’s always healing for me to make it. As an artist, I want to talk about things that are important to people and allow them to feel seen.
Talk to us about your latest project- the release of your sophomore album, Real Talk. What can listeners expect?
I just put it out on September 23rd so I’m super excited about that! I started writing Real Talk during the pandemic and didn’t really know where it was going. I was writing songs that were centered around mental health and were really vulnerable. By the third song, I realized I was writing an album!
This time in the pandemic allowed me time to be introspective and do some inner work and inner feelings. This is my first cohesive album. It’s curated in a way for the tracklist to be listened to in order. This is because it tells a long story about struggling with mental health and coming on the other side, healing.
It’s a 9-track album. The first song, Real Talk, is the preface to the album, and includes the song titles of the rest of the album, which I thought was really cool! I’m so excited about it- it’s one of my most honest projects.
How do you strive to bring comfort and solidarity to your listeners through your music?
It’s important for me to tell stories that are real. The more personal you get, the more universal it becomes- human emotions are so universal. Our most unique experiences are not that unique because we all experience struggles. When I wrote this album, I wanted other people to relate to it. It tells the stories of struggles we all face in our own way.
As a writer, I strive to have someone hear it and say,” I hear this and I felt that,” which is the greatest compliement. I try to keep a sense of authenticity in my music. I hope it brings some people healing and peace, or even just to have them feel like, “I’ve been there and I’m not alone.”
Published by HOLR Magazine.