Abby Kenna Interview

Nervousness set in as I arrived at Union Stage for my interview with up-and-coming artist Abby Kenna. After spending time with her music, I felt it deserved a wider audience. After exchanging messages, we met on a bench overlooking the water at the Wharf. That ended up being all I needed; I felt grounded in that moment. As we talked, the questions began to flow.

Abby Kenna explained when her music career began, saying that she was in one of the School of Rock programs in New Jersey. She thought back, saying, “I think the first song I ever sang on stage was ‘Baba’ by Alanis Morissette.” She recalled being afraid of performing and singing into a microphone. A family member tried encouraging her: “A family member at the time made [these] little pins that said ‘Abby, eat the mic.’”

We discussed the shift from her 2019 project From The Bathroom Floor to her new EP, Chew first, then swallow. Abby said, “Even just reading the lyrics, you can tell a sixteen-year-old was writing the songs. Sonic palette wise, it’s very light. I was in my Taylor Swift era of my life.” By contrast, Chew first, then swallow sounds much darker and features more mature lyrics. Her confidence in the studio has changed, too. Talking about From The Bathroom Floor, she said, “That was my first ever time in a recording studio. I was very afraid of what I didn’t know.” Now, after working with her producer, she feels like it is “more of a collaborative experience rather than just like we should record some guitars.”

I asked about how she was feeling now that Chew first, then swallow is out. She explained, “It’s been a very different experience than my last EP release. Obviously, I’m on tour while it’s happening. It felt like a bigger shift, which I think is really cool.” She talked about how this year she focused on building a visual world around the EP through her Instagram and social presence.

A recent milestone was the inclusion of “Chokehold” on Spotify’s Fresh Finds and Fresh Finds Indie playlists. She was so grateful to know people have been exposed to the EP and are enjoying it.

We discussed how moving from New Jersey to California changed her experience of the music scene. She explained, “I feel like in New Jersey, people were a lot more interested in collaborating and helping each other right off the bat. Not to say LA is not a collaborative community, but I think there’s a barrier to entry. I think the first year or so of me living in LA was hard for me to find people that were extremely open to letting me in on their connections, their process, and their studio. It took a lot of me just showing up until I found my people; they are the most helpful in the world.”

On top of her solo music, Abby Kenna also hosts Chefs Choice: A Ones To Watch podcast. While she had never planned to host a podcast, she credits it with helping her build connections and become a more open and talkative person.

When I asked about her influences outside music, Abby told me, “I feel like Pinterest is my most used app ever. I went through a big Donnie Darko deep dive this year. That was big on the [EP’s] visual influences. Then also there is this David Lynch short film he did, called Rabbits, where people in rabbit costumes just move around in a liminal space. That, combined with Donnie Darko, was really influential.” She also mentioned her love for Dear Hank and John, the podcast hosted by Hank and John Green. “Constant curiosity is the thing I seek” is something she said that really stuck with me after talking to her.

“Severance,” the third track on Abby Kenna’s EP, named after the television series, serves as more than just an ode to the show. She said, “I was going through this bout of anxiety when I watched Severance for the first time. It was getting cold in LA, and I was going through this anxiety. I was in a bad relationship and bad situation. So bad that I started physically manifesting not even tension headaches, but it would just feel like there were fingers on my head at all times. It was very, very bad. I had to get this MRI to see if I had a tumor in my brain. It turned out that it was just anxiety, and as I was watching Severance, I was like, how much of my anxiety makes up who I am? If I were to split my brain in half and make one person the innie, would it go away, or would I be nothing? So I very much inserted myself into that world. I think that probably made the anxiety worse, being honest. But I don’t know; seeing them struggle with it so much was very cathartic for me.”

I asked her why she chose “Quicksand” as the lead single. “Honestly, I think it was a sonic decision. It felt like the closest sonic palette to Spit! It was a little bit lighter, and it wasn’t in-your-face distortion like ‘Faking a fever’ is, but then the chorus has that distortion. If you liked Spit!, you would like where ‘Quicksand’ starts, and then if you can stomach the rest of it, I think you’ll like the rest of the EP too. So it felt like a bridge. It was also more serious; it’s not a song that’s about a romantic relationship. It’s about something that happened in my life. Which brings us into this EP, which is a lot more, I think, mature and grown up. It’s not just about, do they like me back?”

One of my favorite questions to ask an artist is which song they would choose to be a summary of their discography. Abby Kenna chose “Chokehold.” She explained, “
I love that song so much. I wrote it kind of in a daze. I had just gotten back to LA. I had moved home to New Jersey for six weeks because I went through the breakup, which is what that song is about. I was sitting in my friend’s bedroom that I was just, like, crashing in for that month, and playing her guitar and wrote that song, pretty much in one go. Then, bringing it to my producer, Connor, I felt like that was the turning point for us creating the sound of the EP. So I don’t know, I feel like it’s the best of my songwriting and the best of our production thus far. That makes me scared. Like, what if we never do anything better?” “Chokehold” is an incredible song, and hearing how it came together left me excited to hear what she writes next.

To me, songwriting is such a mysterious thing; I find it hard to imagine knowing when a song is finished and ready to release. I asked how she knows when a song is finished. “I honestly don’t,” she said. “This EP is really different. I’m glad I did it this way. I am gonna lean more into it. [With] songs like ‘Faking a fever,’
I had up until the breakdown written, and then, literally, the night before I went to produce it, I wrote that whole outro. The same with ‘Flipping pennies’; I had the chord structure and the basic lyrics of the ‘Are you feeling free’ part. I didn’t know how it was gonna sound. I didn’t know if we would scrap it. Honestly, there were songs that I brought in, and we were like, we don’t know how to make this work yet. But I’m thankful to have a really close relationship with my producer, where I trust his songwriting and production ear.

“So I will bring him literal scraps. Like, there are times I’m not even playing chords. I’m not even singing. I’m just like, here’s this thing. And then he’s like, oh, I can kind of see, and we build it out together. I will say, there is a moment where you take a voice memo of a song, and you listen back to it in the car; maybe yesterday it may have sounded, like, something you’re working on, but when you listen that day, you’re like, oh, that’s the song. Just kind of a feeling. So it just kind of comes when it comes. If it comes? I think you have to, like, believe it at a certain point. I didn’t believe ‘Chokehold.’ I sent it to Connor. I was like, I don’t know about this one. He was like, you don’t get a choice; we’re doing this. Then we recorded it, and I was like, oh yeah, I believe it. I believe in you.”

I asked about her dream collaborators. She said, “Fiona Apple would be crazy. I don’t know where she’s at these days, but if I could just live in her house with her, I’d be so okay. Otherwise, I love Porches. If Porches could produce one of my songs, that would be insane. Um, I love mercury. I think she’s really cool. I would want her to direct a music video of mine. Frost Children, I love. If they remixed one of my songs, that’d be crazy. [Karly Hartzman of Wednesday] She’s just, like, the craziest writer and singer and performer in the world. God, she’s so good. Also, that reminds me of Annie DiRusso. If I could write with her, that would be amazing.”

I asked what it was like to tour with Dev Lemons for a second time. She said, “It’s amazing. She is, herself, the most welcoming person; she truly just took me in. We shared a van on the first tour. Also, her fans are just the most passionate people about loving her music, and you would think that they’re obsessed with her, so they don’t really care about me, but it’s the opposite. They’re like, you’re associated with Dev, and so we’re gonna give you the most support possible. Which is so lovely.
The tour with Dev in February was the longest tour I’ve ever been on, and the most serious. To go out on that, and people were making fan art of me. It’s just so nice. I’m very grateful, and it’s been even more lovely this time around. I can’t get used to it.
I know it’s not always gonna be like this. It’s really, really nice, and I’m sad that my leg of the tour is ending soon.”

When I asked about favorite tour memories, she recalled an off day on the previous tour. “We ended up at this poker restaurant. And we went in, and we were like, is this gonna be a strip club? We didn’t see poker anywhere, but we did find karaoke. When I tell you, this was the most inclusive conservative karaoke bar I have ever seen in my life. It was a spectrum of influences and characters, and yet, everyone had a gun. It was horrifying, but so lovely. A man hit on my boyfriend in that bar, but he also looked like he could have killed us. Like, what is going on? It was awesome. Otherwise, last night, my band and I went to this dog park that sells beer. And so we got drunk on an empty stomach with these dogs.” Something about getting drunk on an empty stomach with dogs sounds like a song screaming to be made.

Rather than asking about a five-year plan, I asked where she hoped to be in a year. “In a year, I would like to be going on tour again. I’m starting my album in two months. So I would like to be decently well into that process. I want to take my time on it. And I think, by this time next year, I’d like to say that I know where I’m headed and what I’m trying to say with it. And how I’m going to expand my world. I feel like this has been a really big growing year for me. It’s been the hardest year of my life, and also the best year of my life. And I would like to feel a little bit more, like... I don’t know. I’ve got my team and my message, and I’m ready to do the thing. Yeah, I just got my frontal lobe this year, so I’m ready to use it.” Hearing about the year she had endured made her excitement for the next chapter especially moving.

At the end of our conversation, I gave Abby Kenna space to share anything else on her mind. She said, “I guess just that I’m really grateful. I feel like, not to make it about me, but it was just a really hard year, and I had a lot of imposter syndrome about this EP coming out, and I really put my back into it, and I did not think I was gonna make it out the other side for a while. Now I’m here, and I feel really supported and loved at these shows, and it’s insane. So I’m excited for what might come of it, even if it’s nothing. I will treasure it forever.”

By the end of our thirty-minute conversation, my nerves were gone, and Abby Kenna felt much less like a stranger. What stayed with me was her willingness to keep creating even when she doubted the work. Please check out Abby Kenna’s Chew first, then swallow, and be on the lookout for more from her!