Michelle Kash – Gravity

By starrymag | February 14, 2025

By: Karen Steinberg

 

 

Q) How would you describe your sound?

A) Like taking a midnight cruise through downtown. A Dark Pop ride through emotional swells of synth waves and dreamy melodies.

 

Q) Who are some of your musical influences?

A) Grace Slick, Debbie Harry, Aretha Franklin, Bob Dylan, Otis Redding, The Kinks, Fiona Apple, Florence and the Machine

 

Q) Talk about the story behind your new song “Gravity.”

A) It seemed that everyone I would fall in love with loved Lou Reed. It seemed that if someone loved Lou Reed it just naturally wouldn’t work out. I love him myself. Loaded is one of my favorite albums. One day, while feeling plagued and quite devastated by the emotional ups and downs of my love life, I was getting off an elevator in a small West Village building and crossed paths with Lou. It felt so surreal and bizarre and kind of a neon sign of some sort, but of what? It was a moment when I felt everything collide and all of my experiences collapse into one another. I couldn’t fight it anymore. Whatever I was doing wasn’t working… So, I just surrendered. I wrote the poem when I got home. He passed away shortly after that.

 

Q) “Gravity” started as a poem based on a chance encounter with Lou Reed. What was it about the experience that left such an impression on you?

A) One night in Brooklyn an ex and I sat in his car on this beautiful night and blasted “Oh Sweet Nuthin’.” It was just a moment of presence and aliveness and connection. “7 minutes of purring” as I wrote in the poem. We had so many painful ups and downs. My previous relationship before them, another ex, Lou Reed was their one. It was an epic failure of a relationship. We were traveling together, at a beautiful beach, in the water, just being, and nothing else existed other than that moment – that taste of salt. It was a similar moment of feeling alive, present, connected. Just awakeness. The chorus is a blend of these two experiences with these two people. You can have these beautiful moments with someone, they can feel like awakenings, yet they disappear.

 

Q) What do you think it is about the song that fans will connect to?

A) I think we all have a person in our life that we just are drawn to, even if you know it isn’t right or healthy. But the memories are so vivid and beautiful, you forget the bad stuff. You forget the pain and just remember the beauty.

 

Q) How does the forthcoming video for the track play into the message behind it?

A) The video is reliving the memories, and even though it ends painfully there was still beauty in the crash.

 

Q) What is your song writing process? Do you need music before you can create lyrics?

A) It goes both ways. “Gravity” started from a poem, so lyrics came first. But mostly they have come together, music with a melody with some lyrics and lyrics coming in after. There is A LOT of doodling on my lyrics pages. Tons. Just doodles and doodles and words and lyrics and then as I turn each page it narrows down and gets simplified and simplified and then all of a sudden there are the lyrics. I love the process of nothingness to something, wave to particle.

 

Q) How much of a hand do you have in the production of your music?

A) I love being involved in the process and things can be very clear of what I envision for the song. That being said, working with Aaron Kamin on this project – we are so aligned, it’s a great feeling.

 

Q) With “Gravity” out on Valentine’s Day, is this a prelude to an EP or full album?

A) Yes. The last couple of years I was very isolated and internal and spent a lot of time writing. It’s some of my most vulnerable work. I still get very emotional when I am working on these songs… I haven’t fully processed the experiences yet. This is my way of working through them.

 

Q) Your cover of “Personal Jesus” by Depeche Mode blew up! Where did the idea come from to put your own spin on it?

A) I just couldn’t get the Depeche Mode song out of my head for a few days… then I thought, “Oh, this would be good in the live set. I wonder if any woman has ever covered it…” I didn’t see any, so I reached out to Neil Rambaldi, my musical director and guitar player. We had been playing together for a couple of years now. He sent me his take on the riff. I got the take, and I just played it over and over in my kitchen while I was cooking (which is a very rare occurrence) and I just vibed with the riff and let whatever wanted to come out to come out. And that’s exactly what’s on the track now. It was a very cool process of creation. We added the song to the live show and then after a while me and Aaron Kamin (producer) were like, “We should record this,” and then we did.

 

Q) Where are some of your favorite places to perform and what makes those locations so significant to you?

A) I love playing around LA. Bar Lubitch was the first show I ever played in LA and it has such a great scene. It’s so intimate and a mood and I just, honestly, love it there. I love Hotel Café. I’ve played a few shows there including my release show for “Smoking Gun” and I have special memories since that was my first single release. It was a beautiful moment for me and such a fun crowd. In NY, I love Heaven Can Wait. It’s such an intimate scene. I had my first show post COVID there and, to be honest, it was supposed to be a warmup show to kind of just get ready for a bigger show and I didn’t expect anyone to be there. And if I’m being totally honest, I probably didn’t want anyone to come either. I just wanted to warm up, but it sold out and it was such a great night. I was so shocked, and the audience was amazing, and it felt so, so good to be playing. I loved it.

 

Q) Who would you most like to collaborate with on a song in the future?

A) There are so many artists that I love and respect it’s insane to choose – I would say Thom Yorke.

 

Q) What artist/musician are you currently listening to and why do you dig them?

A) I love Chappell Roan and just everything Dan Nigro has done. I am also loving Régine Chassagne (Arcade Fire) – just listening to her work a lot lately. As I’m writing this, I can see their overlap sonically and their high register. I’m in a low register so that’s just interesting. But I love their synth pop vibes.

 

Q) What would you like to say to everyone who is a fan and supporter of you and your work?

A) I love and appreciate you. Stay tuned for more, I’m just warming up.

 

 

 

 

Listen to Michelle Kash’s Lastest Single “Gravity”

Michelle Kash – Gravity