Born in Galway in western Ireland, Holly Macve grew up surrounded by music. Her mother – who, fleeing an abusive relationship, took six-month-old Macve and her sister to live with their grandparents in West Yorkshire – is a songwriter, while her grandfather was a classical musician. At 18, Macve moved to Brighton and began singing on open mic nights in a café. Bella Union boss Simon Raymonde frequented the café and went on to sign her at the label, which released Macve’s debut album, Golden Eagle, in 2017. Macve co-produced her second LP, 2021’s Not the Girl, with band member Max Kinghorn-Mills, and the record was mixed by Collin Dupuis, who worked on Lana Del Rey’s Ultraviolence. After Del Rey, an inspiration to Macve since her teenage years, followed her on Instagram a few years ago, the singer-songwriters met in person; following a difficult breakup, Del Rey then hosted Macve in her Los Angeles home and heard her new demos. There, they recorded ‘Suburban House’, the collaboration that’s at the heart of Macve’s February EP Time Is Forever. The songs on the EP are featured on her latest album, Wonderland, which is out this Friday via her own label, Loving Memory. Though musically nostalgic in its evocation of an otherworldly past, Macve employs her wistful, breathtaking voice and lush instrumentation in a way that doesn’t linger on old memories so much as it reaches for a starry, beautiful future, one she can wholly call her own.
We caught up with Holly Macve for the latest edition of our Artist Spotlight series to talk about her earliest musical memories, the making of Wonderland, collaborating with Lana Del Rey, and more.
Tell me about the journey of self-releasing Wonderland, which you also did with the Time Is Forever EP. How has doing things DIY changed your perspective on the process?
You’re so much more involved in every minute detail. It makes it more exciting because you’re just so invested in every single area. I’ve definitely been doing it in a very DIY way, and it’s a learning curve, but I enjoy that process. I do all my visuals, I edit all the videos myself, and it’s a lot of work, but the reward is greater, I guess. The only worry is that when you get into that mindset, it’s kind of scary, then, losing control of that and starting to collaborate with people again. Maybe for my next project, I’ll try to get back into that mindset and do some more collaborations, because you end up wanting to not give away any creative control, and I think that can be dangerous as well.
How early did you know that the songs on the EP would end up on the record? What was the relationship between the two projects as you were working on the songs?
It’s kind of hard to really articulate that. The record feels like a chapter of my life as a whole, and it felt like it should be in one piece of work. I feel like it’s bookending a certain period in my life, from beginning to end. When the EP came out, I kind of knew that I wanted these songs to be part of an album as well. I had a lot of the songs written for the record as a whole, but I hadn’t yet finished them. It felt like the right time to release some music, so I put the EP out, but it was always a plan to have them on an album.
One sequencing choice that I love about bringing the EP songs into Wonderland is ‘Almost a Miracle’ going into ‘Time Is Forever’, juxtaposing the idea that nothing lasts forever with the permanence of time. I don’t know if it was a conscious decision to pair those songs.
Actually, I love that. I think some of these things come out subconsciously, but in terms of the lyrics, that wasn’t something I thought of, so it’s really interesting that you mention that.
There’s a lot of reflection on the concept of forever, so it makes sense that it would come up in different ways.
It’s a theme, I think, in my songwriting in general. I think about the concept of time, the beginning and end of things. That’s something that’s reoccurring, so I guess I may not have noticed it as much because I feel like it comes into my music lot.
I read that the first show you went to with friends was Red Hot Chili Peppers. What do remember about that experience?
I was a big Chili Peppers fan. When I was growing up, one of the first instruments I ever got was the bass – I actually still use it, it’s right next to me right now – but I call that bass Flea. [laughs] That’s the first thing I started learning on – and piano as well. I mean, this is awful, but the main experience I take from that – because I was really small, I was probably 15 or 16, and I was always the smallest within the group – and I remember someone in front of me giving me a shoulder lift so that I could see. But the guy that gave me a shoulder lift was so sweaty that I remember it being transferred onto me. [laughs] That wasn’t so pleasant, but the actual show, I just remember it being so magical. Hearing all those songs that you’d grown up with for the first time was fun.
Are there any other early showgoing experiences that have stuck with you?
I was kind of surrounded by music as a kid in general, so that was the first one that was outside my family. But my mom – me and my sister used to travel with her to these little venues. I remember going to one, I feel like it was Blackpool in the UK, I was about four years old, and just watching her. That’s actually my very earliest memory of music. And my dad was a classical musician, so I used to go and watch that, and I think at the time I didn’t really appreciate it in the way I do now. As a kid, I didn’t quite get it, and I remember growing up and it connecting with me, realizing how much it was to witness him. Those were my earliest memories of going to concerts, but it was more within my family.
Did you make that connection before getting into songwriting yourself?
I think it’s one of those things that you take for granted. That’s just all I knew when I was growing up – I didn’t think it was something out of the ordinary, to have all these instruments around me and everything. As I grew up, I realized that that was quite a special thing, and it definitely enabled me – even to just have the instruments in the house that I could pick up and explore with. I don’t think I recognized that until I was probably in my late teens, and then my grandad passed away, and I started reflecting on all of that stuff. Actually, my first record was titled after my grandad – I wrote ‘Golden Eagle’ [the title track], and it was about him.
So it was through song as well.
Yeah. To be honest, I think I learn about myself through my own songwriting, because the songs I write tend to have very personal lyrics, and there’s a little bit of therapy or something like that. I’m getting all of my ideas out of my brain, and then I see it on paper and I’m like, “Oh yeah, that makes sense. That’s what I was thinking.” It’s like writing diaries or journaling, I suppose.
Growing up, was there a divide between the sort of contemporary artists you were hearing about or going to see and this older world of music that you were fascinated by? I know one of your earliest obsessions was Elvis.
I guess the things that I was drawn to were things that reminded me of music of the past. When I heard voices that took me to that place, that were timeless or made me feel nostalgic, that’s what I was always drawn to. I remember going to see Angel Olsen when I was 18 or something, and I remember it doing that for me. She’s got one of those voices that could be from any time; I think she’s super inspiring. And obviously, Lana’s voice is like that. I love that timeless thing, something that’s gonna take you to a bit of another world, which is why I’m drawn to old film and Elvis and the Everly Brothers.
Another influence you mention in the song ‘Dreamer’ is Sylvia Plath. I know The Bell Jar inspired ‘Eye of the Storm’ from Not the Girl. Is she an inspiration you keep turning to poetically as well?
She definitely is. Not even just her poetry, but her as a person and her mind. I don’t know if you’ve ever read it, but there’s a whole book of her diaries, and there’s something about the fact that she just wanted to dedicate her life to her art – I find that really inspiring. There’s a loneliness or something that I can relate to with her, and I think a lot of women artists maybe do.
Yeah, and I’m now going through the complete collection of her letters that was recently published. I find that with these artists whose work we idealize at an early age, we’re then drawn to understand their personal lives or the nuances of their personhood. There’s definitely some of that with the Priscilla and Elvis movies that have come out in recent years. Does that resonate with you?
Definitely. I suppose the more you get to know the person behind the art, you can almost figure out how the art came about as well. It all makes sense. I definitely feel that. I really have enjoyed all the Elvis stuff that’s been coming out. I’ve actually got a big Elvis poster behind me, as you can see. [laughs]
You’ve described Not the Girl as a coming-of-age album, but Wonderland seems to embrace a different perspective. To me, it’s more reflective and weighted in the way it’s looking back. You said that it represents a specific period in your life – how do you now see that period reflected on the record?
You’re right, I remember saying that about Not the Girl. It felt like that at the time. I think I felt more unsure of myself, and I think Wonderland is me feeling like I’ve actually really got to know myself and who I am. I think Wonderland is meant to represent this chapter of looking forward, maybe, rather than back. I went through a lot during that process of writing Wonderland, a lot of big life changes. Living situations, coming out of the pandemic, going through a big breakup. Spending a lot of time in LA, and then spending a lot of time on my own as well after not doing that for years. There was a lot reflecting that happened and a lot of time that I had to get to know myself – who I am on my own without being in a relationship, what I want in life, what my dreams and aspirations are as an individual person. I think it’s very much getting to know myself again after maybe going through a period of time where I didn’t.
There is this diaristic quality to a lot of the songs on the album, but it also seems like you’re addressing your younger self in a way that takes away some of the darkness from the past, like when you sing, “It was just the beginning, I thought it was the end” on ‘Beauty Queen’. Was it freeing to write from this perspective?
Definitely. I like the way that you worded that. With ‘Beauty Queen’, it was quite a cathartic thing, because I felt almost like I was nurturing my younger self. That song is about an experience I had as a young woman, and I think at the time, I was very unkind to myself and was just seeing it in a very different light. In hindsight, I can look back at that, and it was like I was looking after my younger self, in the hope that if there are women who have had similar experiences, maybe the song could speak to them in the way that I was speaking to my younger self.
Has it been a learning curve, too, finding ways to be kinder to yourself in the writing process?
I think it probably is. As a writer, you’re always evolving and changing, and I think in my earlier writing, I probably was harder on myself. And maybe with these songs, I feel like there’s a lot of darkness being covered, but hopefully it’s done in a kind of lighter way than my earlier songwriting.
There’s a sense of sisterhood on songs like ‘Beauty Queen’ and ‘Cold Water Canyon’ as well.
Yeah, that’s very true. I have been surrounded by some really special women over the past few years, and that probably has come out in the songwriting. After coming out of a relationship, leaning on the women in my life, that felt important – and making new connections there as well. That’s definitely a part of it.
How did ‘Suburban House’ become the song that you decided to sing with Lana Del Rey?
It was actually quite spontaneous. I’d written this song, and I was going through a time where I really felt like I needed to do something different, and I flew to LA really spontaneously. Lana and I met previously only once, I think, but we’ve had a friendship over the years through writing to each other. I was hanging out with her, and I played that song because I’d just written it. I played it live on the piano to her, and her dad was there as well. It was a beautiful little day where we were hanging out and sharing music together. There was something that clicked while I was playing; we’d been wanting to do some sort of collaboration, we’d spoken about it, but it wasn’t clear what it was. When I played that song, she started singing along, and we realized then and there that that was the one we wanted to do together. It felt right. Then, a couple of weeks later, we recorded it. But as soon as I heard her singing the verse, it kind of felt like I’d written it for her or something. Whenever I sing that verse on my own, I’m like, “I wish Lana was here singing that,” because it feels like it’s her verse. I’m so grateful to have her on it because she’s incredible.
In a press release for the song, she mentioned how your vocals have inspired her over the years. In what ways does she inspire you, be it musically or personally?
Definitely both personally and musically. Musically, I was probably 15 or 16 when ‘Video Games’ came out, and I remember someone sending it to me. Like what I was talking about earlier with those voices that take you to another world, I remember hearing that and it was unlike anything I was listening to at the time or any kind of current music. It just felt so timeless. I love how she’s always made her own world and she’s just so unique. Personally as well, she’s a very inspiring person. She’s just so authentically herself – she’ll just do whatever feels right to her, and she’s not trying to fit into any box or anything. She doesn’t care. She’s just following her own path, and I think that’s really inspiring.
Could you walk me through the timeline of writing and recording Wonderland?
Actually, ‘Beauty Queen’ was one of the first songs that I wrote for the album – it’s interesting because we were talking about it being this thing of looking back. That set the tone, maybe. I also started writing ‘San Fran Honey’ first, but that kept on – I usually write a song in a day and I’ll stick with it how it is, but with ‘San Fran Honey’, it was a process of rewriting things. But that was also one of the earlier ones. I guess that was a few years ago, and I didn’t really sit down to write the record – like diary entries, it all just came quite naturally over a few years.
The recording was a mixture of – I did some of it at home, some of it evolved from early demos I had. And then I spent some time in LA in a beautiful studio called Valentine Studio, which is all old analog gear; that was a really great experience. And then I met Dan Rothman from London Grammar – I’d say that was part two of the EP/album. When I met Dan, that was kind of the second half of it, but it felt like the songs needed the first songs as well. It was just perfect timing, because I felt like he really understood what I was trying to do. That’s when we brought in a guy called David Saunders, who did the string arrangements. That was a click moment where it was the kind of sound I was looking for ever since I’ve been making music. When we got him on board, it was really special and magical.
I’m assuming the title track is one of the songs that came later, because it’s more indicative of this looking ahead. Even just the way it begins: “This time, I will not follow.”
Definitely, yeah. That’s very perceptive, because actually, that was the last song that was written for the record, even though it’s one of the first ones I released, and it’s the opening track. And you’re right, it’s very much looking forward rather than back. I wanted to set the tone of the album; I wanted it to have a hopeful feel about it.
I love the atmospheric flourishes throughout ‘Best of Your Heart’. What was it like piecing that one together?
That was one of those moments where it all made sense. Dan did these amazing soundscapes on that. I think it was ‘Wonderland’ and then that was the was the first one that Dan really worked on production-wise, and he was feeling really inspired. That’s when we’d just got David on board doing strings, and it was this moment where we all felt really excited and inspired.
What are you most proud of yourself for with the release of Wonderland?
The way I’ve done it in a pretty DIY way, all of the visual stuff, I feel like it’s aiming to create a little world – and I think when you are making a lot of the creative choices yourself, it ends up being a little world you make. I hope other people feel like that and enjoy stepping into that world with me.
You mentioned possibly opening up that world to more collaborators in the future – what excites you about that?
This is the thing – when you do it yourself and it’s all an internal little world, and then you open that up to other people and other artists, it ends up being something you could never have made on your own. I’m excited to step out of that for the next project. I’ve done the more insular thing, the diary thing – maybe I’ll end up opening it up and creating something that I feel like is something I never could have done just on my own. That’s the beautiful thing about collaborating.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and length.
Holly Macve’s Wonderland is out October 11 via Loving Memory.