motel void

Ottawa-born musician Maeisfine blends slowcore sounds reminiscent of salvia palth & Cat Power with dreamy pop influences from artists like Cocteau Twins.

MOTEL VOID: You released your debut single ‘Balcony theory’ last November. You produced this song all by yourself, what kind of DAW did you use? And how did your recording process look like?

MAEISFINE: Oh man. The production of balcony theory was messy… it was me with 0 recording experience, 0 production experience, 0 knowledge of music theory… an iPhone… a discord server with just me in it to transfer voice memo files from my phone to my computer… a free in browser DAW called “bandlab”. One sleepless night, a lot of tears.

One spontaneous payment for distribution and it was just there..
for whoever wanted to listen.. i guess it was an interesting marketing tactic to just suddenly put on my instagram “hey I just released this song I wrote last night there’s no release date because I just pressed the button that said asap and now we wait an undetermined amount of time for processing here’s a pre-save link!”

I love it, I love all of its mistakes, its breathiness from a bad phone mic, its zero build and steady tone, no dramatic changes… no changes at all really- mostly words. I love it because I wrote it out of love and it meant something to me, and still does. I’m not sure how to explain it aside from just saying “it felt like me” and making it felt like falling in love.

Shout out to my good friend O Dahl who jokingly said “all this needs is a tuba”. Because when I played along with that joke, the tuba synth tied in well with the clarinet synth I had in there – brought it all together – and it stuck.

MOTEL VOID: After this track, you embraced collaborating with your local friends. You’re from Ottawa, Canada. Do you have any favorite local venues and artists? Is there someone you would like to collaborate with in the future?

MAEISFINE: Yeah of course! I’m really trying to put my focus in being a active member in all parts of the community but especially the music scene, my latest release “you are, M & J” is a collaboration written with my partner who I now plan to work with in terms of production moving forward. He is incredibly talented and has lots of his own self produced music out there that’s all him, a man of many aliases and genres but some of my favourites can be found on Spotify under John fog & fox fielder

I really want to experiment with different genres and let each person I collaborate with have their personality and style really shine through in the songs. In hopes they’ll all be very different and unique showcasing who they are just as much as who I am in the music, showcasing all the different sounds we have here in Ottawa.
the incredible Dipper who you can find on Spotify and I have a song we’re eager to start working on and I hope for that to be my next release.

For venues: I really love the space at LIVE on Elgin!
They’re so versatile with all the different kinds of events/artist they host.

For artist: I have a playlist on my Spotify spotlight that features all of my favourite locals and a few international small creators. I do think if you’re not listening to Robin Kenny you’re seriously missing out on some out of this world stuff. Her newest release “old man” will take over your life, probably my most listened to song of 2024 despite only being released about a month ago.

MOTEL VOID: You’ve got a litle kid – is it where your inspiration comes from these days? And do you – as a mother – find enough time for writing and recording songs? How difficult is it for you to play live shows?

MAEISFINE: He definitely makes me see the world in a different light, children see with hope, they’re so eager to learn but more importantly have so little to unlearn unlike us, they’re honest and i find a lot of my lyrics lean towards these themes of honesty and accepting the unknown. Learning new parts and unlearning parts of you that no longer serve you.

It’s not too hard to carve out the time. He’s my biggest fan, he loves to hear what I’m working on, he’s also my biggest critic and has no shame in telling me just a plain “no” when I ask “did you like that one?”

I’m focusing on writing right now, I don’t have much of a set list yet so live shows haven’t been the forefront of my mind. He loves coming along to see my friends play, though, so I imagine he’d occasionally join me on that journey aswell!

MOTEL VOID: You’re inspired by artists like salvia palth, Cat Power, Cocteau Twins, Japanese Breakfast. What is it, in particular, that you like about their music the most?

MAEISFINE: I think when it comes to my own personal process of writing and musical stylings I really like this raw authentic sound that doesn’t really need to be put in its own box or have those more traditional structures a song would typically have. I think these guys really showcase that in their all very different kinds of songs and music. Sometimes you just got things you wanna say and sounds you wanna make without worrying about structures or algorithms or what “objectively” sounds good. Just feelings & noise that makes you feel. Songs that you make for yourself. Songs that are sharing yourself.

MOTEL VOID: Do you plan to release a full-length album anytime soon?

MAEISFINE: I’m unsure about this still, if I do it wouldn’t be anything particularly cohesive, going back to the topic of collaborations it would be an album of songs that exclusively have tracks I’ve written for or with local talent leaning into their musical stylings. So each song would hopefully be wildly different from the last with no particular over arching theme.

Balcony Theory is also featured on our Spotify playlist: