Kate Stephenson’s Diary is On Display

Kate Stephenson has just played a gorgeous set in the cozy Zonzij room of Amsterdam’s Tolhuistuin. On stage, she recounts the stories behind each song she plays, opening up to the audience in a way that is both generous and endearing. 

After every song she coyly says, “the end”, though it feels very much like a beginning we’re witnessing. 

I meet her afterwards at the merch table, where she is chatting with each person as if they’ve been life-long friends. We head down to the green room once she’s made it through the long line of fans for a post-show debrief.

Stephenson in Amsterdam with Fairhazel. Photo by Jill Nuelle.

TMB: Where do we begin?! This was the last show for you on this tour. (Her first ever headline run). 

KS: Yes, it’s crazy.

TMB: How has it been playing these shows in Europe? Have you noticed a big difference between the crowds here and the U.S. crowds?

KS: The crowds here are so much more attentive — and I have played for a lot of really respectful crowds in the States, so it's not all of them — but I feel like every single show that I've walked into here, I've been more nervous than ever before because I know for a fact that everyone is really listening. Usually, I can rely on like four people in the back shouting, you know? The crowds here have been really respectful and it’s been really cool.

Also, everyone has been so kind after the shows. It's fun to meet people who I otherwise probably never would have crossed paths with, being so far away. It's been a really unique, hopefully not once in a lifetime experience. I'll remember this forever. It's my first headline tour and it happened to be in Europe and people actually came. Every show I was like, okay, this is going to be the one where there's three people. And there was not a show that had three people. It blows my mind and it's all because of the internet. 

TMB: I can imagine that is a trip since you don’t have as much of a concept of how many people here are listening, never having toured here before.

KS: Right, I can go to Spotify and it can tell me that 45 people in Berlin streamed my song, but you know, how is that gonna translate? There's been no way of knowing for sure except for trying to find the ticket count and I didn't know the ticket count for any show going into it so yeah, it's been really special.

TMB: And speaking as a fan, I'm going to get to say down the road “I saw her first ever headline tour, I knew her when.”

KS: That’s awesome.

TMB: I really feel that way! Also, my friends were saying it was like you could be a stand-up comedian with all the stories you were telling. 

KS: That actually feels so good to hear because sometimes I'm showering after a show and I'm like fuck fuck fuck fuck I talked so much.

TMB: No, we loved it. I especially think when it's a more intimate type of show you feel such a connection when an artist engages in that way. I love hearing the inside scoop behind some of the lyrics. And speaking of lyrics, I feel like your brand of songwriting is so specific, but it's interesting because I find myself relating to very niche pieces of it. I’m like, how did she get my journal?

I wonder how that feels for you? I'm assuming a lot of these songs are coming from really personal places. 

KS: Yes.

TMB: So does it ever feel strange to you when you hear from people how much they relate to it? Or what feeling does it bring for you? 

KS: It's a super complex, interesting feeling for sure. It almost feels more rewarding than anything else. When I first started writing music, I was seven. I literally wrote a song about my Legos. That transitioned to middle school when I was writing music based on the Wattpad books that I read.

TMB: Obsessed.

KS: Because of course I just hadn't experienced anything before. Once I started actually experiencing things for the first time it occurred to me that it's actually really scary to write that shit and then actually show people.

It is diary music for sure, it always has been. When I write music it's because I have to. I'm in a place where the only way to get through it is to process it in a song. It's just how my brain works. The actual releasing of that took a long time to feel comfortable doing, especially because, like, my dad is listening! With a song like “Shoving” for example, that’s tough.

So if anything it feels really rewarding when I find a reason for why it was worth it to share my diary to the world. Really, we're all living the same experiences, especially women. To have somebody come up to me and say, yeah, the exact same thing happened to me… it’s like, thank God! Otherwise I would have just put that out into the world for no reason.

TMB: Right, there’s a connection there.

KS: It feels really good. It's nice to know that it can help people as well. That feels really, really cool because it helped me too. I'm right there with you. We are coming at this from the same side. (Laughing) I'm my number one most listened to artist.

TMB: As it should be. 

KS: No music is more relatable than music you write about yourself. 

TMB: Like, thank God someone's finally talking about this!

KS: You guys are hearing this too? I’ve been on that shit! 

Photo by @izzyoffer. Courtesy of IG: kate_stephenson

TMB: On the theme of lyrics, in so many of your songs you have these amazing one liners. Like the last line in “Shoving", actually. [When push comes to shove, I'm certainly shoving.] So I wonder if that comes to you first — those kinds of hooks — and then you build a song around it? Or do they emerge more as part of your larger process?

KS: Well, it goes back and forth. I have this really long note on my phone of ideas or phrases that spark something. With some songs, it starts there. For “Shoving” specifically, it was so brain to page, and chronologically written from the first line to the last line.

I wrote the first two verses long before I ever finished writing the song. And I wrote those first two verses quite literally in tears, I have pictures to prove it. I eventually went into a session and we were working on “Summerfoot”. The producer I was working with asked if I wanted to tinker on anything else, and I was like well, I have this song that I’ve been sitting on. He said okay, let's play it out. So we were just jamming, and you can kind of hear that in the song too. It builds up, and then that last line kind of hits with a boom. We looked at each other and knew that we had gotten it. So that’s an example of one that came more from playing with the song. But a lot of them do start from the notes app.

TMB: I love that. And speaking of “Summerfoot”, I'm obsessed. It actually was the song of my summer. I listened to it nonstop.

KS: (Fist pumps) Yes! 

TMB: It's such a different sound from a lot of the stuff that you've made. And you said on stage that you were happier when writing it, so it makes sense.

KS: I was experiencing joy.

TMB: And I hope that you have more of that soon! I was wondering if there was any other sort of inspiration for the twangier sound, maybe it’s the Nashville living?

KS: Yeah, I do think it’s been living in Nashville for a bit. I feel like I've been surrounded by twang and I actually really enjoy twang.

TMB: Me too. 

KS: One day I'm going to release a pop-country album.

TMB: Don’t tease me. That sounds incredible. 

KS: I will also be releasing a screamo song. There are a lot of genres that I really enjoy that I want to dip my toes into. But back to “Summerfoot”, I honestly feel like a lot of it was Jeremy. I was working with a fellow named Jeremy Schmetterer and it was just the two of us in his home studio. He just has a mind.

I had the chords in the first verse written, and I had no idea where to take it from there. He just made it writeable. He recorded the progression that we were working on, put some drums on it, and all of the sudden the way that the drums sounded inspired me to start with the guitar melody over it. He was so open to where I was taking it, and I felt very comfortable in that room to do anything. He's very much a ‘nothing is a bad idea’ person. Nothing is stupid, hence the twang. 

TMB: Well, I love it. The guitar specifically really scratched an itch in my brain that every time I would play it I immediately needed to play it again. 

KS: I’m honored. 

TMB: You talking about all the different genres you’d like to explore brings me to my next question, and I did stalk you a little bit so don’t be creeped out. 

KS: No, that’s so okay. Thank you actually.

TMB: I was looking at some of your playlists that you had up on Spotify.

KS: Yes... (already laughing).

TMB: I came upon your ‘Pimpus Maximus Anthems’ mix [the description of which reads “My All timers unfortunately.”]

KS: My best work.

TMB: I have to say I was like, okay, I think we're twin flames. We have a very similar taste profile.

KS: Amazing. 

TMB: But truly, what a range of genres present there. You’re going from Dierks Bentley to Glen Hansard to the Bonnie Light Horseman, who I love by the way. Not enough people know about them.

KS: Oh my God, right?!

TMB: Then you have “Once Upon a December” from Anastasia, which is when I really knew we were gonna have a lot to talk about.

KS: (Laughing) It's an all over the place playlist. People usually tell me to turn it off in the van.

TMB: I would never be one of those people. But two questions came up while looking through it. Number one, what constitutes an all-timer for you? And secondly, do you find that all of your different tastes converge when you're making your own music, or do you ever have to fight some of those influences because there’s too much happening?

KS: Well, an all-timer is first of all just a good song, right? Like “Once Upon A December”. But for me, most of the songs in that playlist are tied to a specific memory. It feels good to listen to because I feel like it transports me back somewhere. Like when I was watching Anastasia.

TMB: Exactly. 

KS: It’s such a mix though. I went through a phase where I was so sad that the only thing I could listen to was screamo because it would make me laugh. And then I realized it's actually really fucking good. I've had a lot of playlists in my life that are tons and tons of songs and I just went through all of them and asked myself which ones do I not ever skip? 

I can't pin down exactly what it is that makes them unskippable, but it is that thing where when the song plays, I automatically feel something. There's no song on that playlist that comes on and I don't either laugh, get teary-eyed, or get inspired. 

To your second question, I do have to fight it sometimes just because I feel like a lot of people like to have a certain sound that they can rely on from the artists that they listen to. However, I have a secret plan — I would feel bad making people pre-save it so it'll probably be a surprise drop — but I am gonna make an album where I do all the genres I've ever wanted to do. I don't know when, but someday there will be an album that has the country song, and the screamo song, and you know what — fuck it — opera.

TMB: I'm putting a Google alert out. Please let me know and I'll promo it for you.

KS: It'll probably be like a cello solo piece too. 

TMB: Everything you're saying convinces me more. I’m sold.

I did want to talk to you a little bit about the show tonight, were you having fun up there? It felt like you were. 

KS: I had so much fun. I did.

TMB: Do you ever have moments where an audience surprises you? Throughout this tour have there been songs that have surprised you with how the crowd has reacted to them? 

KS: Definitely. I feel like there have been some songs where people have laughed at lyrics that I never thought of before as a funny lyric. Not in a way that offended me at all, actually in a way that was really great. 

I keep talking about “Shoving”, but there was one show where I sang that line “I will not miss him, I'll only miss who he was when he wanted to fuck me,” and everyone laughed. And it shocked me, but then I thought like, yeah actually, that is funny. That is jarring. And when I wrote it, I was, you know, trying to be so dramatic. There’s songs where people took notice of certain lines that I was waiting for, like finally people are laughing at that. And then others, like that one, where I didn’t even realize that was a possible reaction. And that’s really cool to me.

TMB: So cool.

KS: Tonight felt really good up there. I had a really good time. There were a lot of moments in this show specifically, mostly because there were so many people, where I really became intensely aware that I was on a stage in front of an audience. At certain times that made me really scared, and then at other times made me want to cry. And then I was like, nope, can't do that to my vocal cords. 

TMB: You did great. I never would have guessed.

KS: Phew, thank you.

TMB: And you have more touring in the U.S. to round out the fall. Do you like being on the road? 

KS: Yes. I love being on the road. I was just on the road for an entire year.

TMB: Wow. 

KS: Yeah, all of last year. Then I moved to Nashville because I was like, ‘I'm putting my roots down.’ And then I immediately left. (Laughs)

I think because I toured for so long a year ago, right now at this moment, I'm homesick for sure. Part of that is being in so many different countries, switching currencies and languages. I speak none of them, which is my bad, I probably should have hit Duo Lingo a little bit before going to Prague. But in general, I like driving. I love being in a car. I love looking out the window and being able to pull over at a gas station because I thought the view was cool. 

The difference here is I hate airplanes. I literally face and accept death on every flight I've ever been on. And then I cry. And then I have to face my neighbors. So I think right now, I'm definitely excited to get home. I'm sad that it's over, but now I get to hang around Amsterdam for a week and just go on walks, explore, and feel less stressed. 

TMB: Completely understandable. This is kind of a non sequitur to end on, but I have to acknowledge that you were raised in Illinois and so was I. 

KS: No fucking way!

TMB: My question is, do you feel like your Midwestern roots impact the music you're making?

KS: Absolutely yes. I think that the reason I make music is because of the Midwestern roots. There are people in a lot of places who get this but I feel like I realized it when I briefly went to school in California. I dropped out really fast. When I first got there, it occurred to me that people were very different. Of course it wasn’t everyone, there were a lot of really awesome people too, but there were people who had never in their life been bored.

TMB: Oh, totally.

KS: I feel like a lot of them, again, not everyone, but a lot of people who had grown up with things to do around them all the time, their relationships were more for how can this person benefit me socially. It occurred to me then, that the reason that I'm able to have meaningful conversations with people is because all we did for fun was like, drive to Wisconsin. And go lick a fence. Because it's tradition to lick the fence?

So I feel like a lot of my music comes from the ability to be bored, and the ability to fix being bored by doing something that otherwise could be really mundane, but with other people it’s not. That led me to not only be able to communicate with other people very deeply and efficiently, but also with myself.

Being bored is a beautiful thing, well, most of the time. Sometimes it's just me and her. (Pointing to herself.)  She's fucking evil. (Laughs).

TMB: Then the voices come in. 

KS: You get it.

KS: Definitely though, the twang that we were talking about, it’s also from driving to what feels like the country for a Midwesterner. Like Minooka, Illinois.

TMB: One thousand percent.

KS: We were breaking and entering and getting caught. A lot of the experiences that I've had and then the thoughts about those experiences that led to songwriting came from boredom. I feel like that's something that's very specific to the Midwest region, and I’m sure in other regions as well, but we get bored AND cold.  

TMB: Nobody gets that. 

KS: Really fucking cold. 

TMB: And you’re liking being in Nashville now? It’s definitely warmer.

KS: I do. It's the first place I've lived where my lunch table would runneth over, so to speak. I think this is the first time where I've had an actual supportive group of people around me. And it's so lovely. 

TMB: Are you playing music there? 

KS: A good amount, but I mostly do writing. I've been trying to get some more gigs around there, but right now all the shows that I play are venue ticketed shows. But I want to try to do more just showing up.

It’d be a real stroke of luck if Stephenson ‘just showed up’ to where you were. She’s a delight.