Orla Gartland: You wouldn't choose to be a musician

My first few years in music, I did a lot of writing sessions and recording with older male producers. A lot of those people, maybe they didn’t mean to, but they made me feel very small.

Sat, 16 Jul, 2022 - 02:00

Nicole Glennon

I grew up in Drumcondra, right beside Croke Park, the oldest of three. It was my mum, dad, and younger sister and brother, Niamh and Ciarán. My memory of my younger self is a bit more sweet than I think I actually was... I found a load of home tapes in the attic last year that I got digitized for Christmas. I was hoping to look back at them and find some sort of early prodigy music performances or something. But actually, I just found out that I was really annoying. Constantly stealing the spotlight, pushing my sister over anytime she was being filmed so I could get in the camera...

I've never really been able to trace where the music came from, though my parents both love music in their own way. My mum was always in choirs, and my dad doesn't play or sing or anything, but he always had music playing in the house. I have a couple of aunts and uncles that sing but there are no career musicians in the family.

Though I was a bit of a brat when I was younger, I definitely became quieter and shyer when I got to school. When I did start playing guitar in secondary school and putting up videos on Youtube, the last thing I wanted was anyone in my school knowing. At that age, all you want to do is be the same as everyone else. It's not until you get to your twenties that being a bit weird is suddenly celebrated. Anything that you do that's kind of brave or different, is great then, but when you're like 14/15 you just don't want anyone to know. Music was always kind of like my secret hobby.

Orla Gartland backstage at The Late Late Show

I got into Youtube at a really interesting time. It was still quite a weird thing to do back then, it felt pretty niche. I remember being amazed at the idea that you could record a song in your bedroom and then put it up and someone from like the Philippines might comment and give you feedback. Now it seems like the most normal thing in the world, but I remember thinking that was just so crazy. I think I was 13 when I posted my first video. I’d only been playing the guitar a few weeks. There’s a lot of really early, shit videos that I’ve since privatised...

The first song I wrote was awful. It was called ‘Green Eyed Monster’ and it was about a girl at school that I was jealous of. It was terrible, but also really kind of cute in its way. Those first few songs I have are all so dramatic. Your world is so small at that age, but your emotions are so heightened. Everything that makes you angry makes you the most angry you've ever been.

I do think I was born to be the person I am. I don't think everyone has only one life path that they can take. We have our own autonomy about how that looks and the choices we make... but I do genuinely feel like I shouldn’t be doing anything else. This job is so bizarre and hard, but even when it's been the hardest it's ever been I've never thought maybe this isn't what I should be doing. Being a musician, it's almost vocational. You wouldn't choose this. You would be so mad to choose this life. I love it but there's so little going for it. There's no money to be made. It is so competitive, and even with the touring, my tour is in decent venues and they're sold out, on the outside it looks really great... but it is highly unglamorous. There's so much rubbish in between all the good bits.

The greatest challenge I've faced is probably my struggle with confidence, and the feeling of being willing to take up more space. It always sounds really rich saying that when you have a job like this because people see you putting yourself up on the stage... but, at first, being on a stage didn't feel natural at all to me. When I started, the crippling nerves before a show were not worth the pay off. I pushed through because I believed that one day, the good feelings would outweigh the agony, and that's true now. But for years, they didn't. In studio scenarios, I felt it even more. I think my first few years in music, I did a lot of writing sessions and recording with older male producers. Before I knew anything about production, I relied on people like that to help me just get music finished. They had something I needed and I definitely couldn't do it on my own at that point. Now I am a lot better at production and I can make really good demos by myself so I rely on those kind of people less, but at the beginning, I really relied on them a lot, and a lot of those people, maybe they didn’t mean to, but they definitely made me feel very small.

My proudest achievement has been releasing my album, ‘Woman on the Internet.’ I was in EP land for years, which is a safe place to be, but I was so desperate to have a big body of work. When it actually happened, it felt like a big, big milestone.

I think my greatest quality is that I'm a good listener. I do talk about myself a lot. As an artist, I am self aware about how indulgent the whole thing is, and how the people who are closest to me have to deal with me being like ‘hey, here's 25 different almost identical versions of the same song can you just listen to these and rank them’. I can make things all about myself pretty easily. But on the flip side, I do think that when other people need to talk about them... I like to think I'm good at being that listening ear.

Since lockdown, I have had the overwhelming feeling that nothing matters, but not in a sad way. I've just had some perspective.

When I'm really stressing about the minute details of my day, I like reminding myself that I'm on a spinning rock. My stresses and problems might feel absolutely massive, but they don't really matter. I do like that thought.

If I had taken a different fork in the road, I would have loved to be a graphic designer. You can imagine how distraught my parents were... music or art!