Lucy Woodward – Interview

Lucy Woodward talks the talk!

How are you?

Good, am I pretty much on time? All my clocks have different times.

Do you set them all fast?

One is like fast, one is slow and then the one on my cell phone I think is right.

I know you have a show tonight.

Yeah. Here in New York. I’ve been practicing a lot with a full band and tonight is my first gig with the new band. I’m really excited about that.

How have the radio shows been?

I’ve been doing a lot of them since February trying to get everyone to listen to my song.

Were you playing shows before you got signed?

I got signed about a year ago; wow almost a year ago it’s amazing. I was making a living as a singer doing background vocals and doing jingles and in cover bands. I was making my living as a singer and an A&R from Atlantic saw me and brought me up to meet the President. Once I met the president they signed me within twenty-four hours and I was working on the record within two months.

Were you taking jobs as they came along?

Totally. I was doing a lot of jingles. You have a job in the morning where you sound like Nelly Furtado and then like Janis Joplin later in the day. When you know you can make money singing for a living you’ll take anything that comes along. But you can go weeks at a time where you aren’t making any money at all and then there are weeks where you are so excited like ‘oh my God I’m going to buy a house’. You never know when you are going to get a job or paid so you take what you can and hopefully you get something. It builds your chops on the business level especially working with people. It’s really important. I know what it’s like to be a hired gun. I haven’t been Lucy Woodward the diva.

Have you been writing before you got signed?

I’ve been writing for years. I had about seven or eight songs that are on the record I wrote before. I had other songs that I had to axe because I knew I could write better songs. So I really wrote four songs after I got the deal.

When you wrote “Dumb Girls” did you know it was good?

No way. I wrote it at the end of a breakup. I started it in New York with my manager and I wanted to finish it with my friend Kevin. I knew we had something special but you start a lot of songs and you either finish it or you put it on the shelf and find it later. But this was one of the songs I knew was special. The record is the demo. We added a little drum thing but the writing demo is the version you hear. You never know your song is going to reach a million people.

Was the sound of the record what you had always envisioned?

I love my record. It’s funky and soulful and totally rockin’.

I know you were born in England but moved to New York very young right?

Yeah. I moved to New York when I was five. My mom took us to the States where she was from and I would stay my summers in Holland with my dad. We would travel around Europe during my summers. My dad gave me a lot of perspective of the world. When I was with my dad for that month it opened me up.

It sounds very cool.

There are benefits of having divorced parents. (Laughs)

Did you know that you wanted to get into parents?

My parents were both into music. My mom was an opera singer and a belly dancer. So we had a lot of Middle Eastern music growing up. I didn’t pick that up into my music. When I hear that music I feel so at home. My dad was very musical too. He was a conductor. My mom was an opera singer when I was in the womb so there is no way it couldn’t pass onto me. From five years old I was playing piano. I’ve always put everything into music. There is no way you can avoid it.

What were your parent’s thoughts when you were doing popular music?

My dad was doing more modern classical music but we can talk about music and he gave me constructive criticism on my music. I would be like ‘dad you don’t know anything about pop music’ but he really did because he grew up on the Beatles. He’s an English music fan. So he did know things in the end. I couldn’t really ask my parents for help in my kind of music because they didn’t know the industry. I couldn’t ask my dad how to write a song or stuff like that. I knew I had to create my own sound.

What did you and didn’t you expect about the music industry?

I only knew what it was like to be a hired hand but someone taught me to be nice to everybody and to be very courteous. I knew it was important to respect everyone. That is the number one thing over musicality. I think you’ll be hired in the end for what you can do with music.

Were you surprised about how much was needed of you that didn’t involve music?

(Laughs) It’s hardly about the singing at all. There are some days where you have like ten interviews in a row like this, today it is just you (Laughs), but some days you are doing so much press and you aren’t singing. Singing is easy. I was rehearsing last week with my band and I couldn’t talk for days because I was hoarse, but that is just natural emotion. But with press it’s more mental where you have to be awake and more clear headed whereas with music it’s just ‘let’s just sing!’

Are you ever like ‘wow, I’m making a living singing’?

All the time. I’ve been feeling that feeling since, I’m twenty-six now, nineteen. I’m not waiting tables anymore and it’s cool making original music and doing it professionally. I’m also so much more excited because these are my songs.

What is easier; singing or writing?

Singing is natural and always was. Writing is something I’ll always get better at. Writing is something I hope to be doing for the rest of my life. One day I’d like to do a cover record where I sing like Dusty Springfiled or U2 or some old Jazz standards. I love singing other artists songs and I always will. I have a lot of things I still want to sing and write about. As I get older I’ll find ways to write about them. I always have a melody in my head and it starts from there. I have melodies in my head for days that just won’t go away.

You are doing your own thing now, but what are you dreaming about now?

I’m still dreaming about my shows. I’d really like to open up for like Lenny Kravitz or someone like that. I’m still looking at myself as ‘I want to open up for this person’ and not ‘who do I want to open up for me’. I still have to check myself. I got this deal quickly and I could lose it quickly. It’s just the way the business is. I love what I’m doing and put everything I have into it so it’s good to check yourself. There are so many people who don’t get this far and it’s amazing when you do.

+ Charlie Craine