Q&A: Abby Sage Holds the World in Her Paper Mache Hands
ABBY SAGE DESCRIBES HER MUSIC AS “QUIET CONFIDENCE” — a fitting description of the artist herself. Thoughtful and ethereal, Sage sonically wears her heart on her sleeve. Her intimate, melodic lyrics weave a delicate picture of her esoteric inner world. Organic, tactile, and fluid, the world Sage paints in her music is one of somewhat ominous fantasy, a careful ode to her inner child.
The singer-songwriter is making a name for herself in the indie world with her gossamer, dreamy discography of rainy day coffeehouse tracks. Marking her style boldly, she does so in part with her whimsical worldbuilding and sense of theater. This is underscored perfectly by larger-than-life paper mache hands, which have accompanied her on stage throughout her tour with Gus Dapperton, as well as to Austin City Limits.
Her most recent single, “Milk,” explores the idea of the inner child, digging into feelings of grit and wildness. Layered and dimensional, the track itself feels like a sonic milk bath, deeply immersive and somewhat murky.
Sage shares that her coming LP builds on these themes of nostalgia and coming of age, something that is sure to be a beautiful work of self-exploration. Read on to learn more and dive into the immersive world of Abby Sage.
LUNA: I'd love to hear a little bit about your background as an artist and how you got into the industry.
SAGE: I was born in Canada — I didn't live there for very long, but I started recording out there. Before that, I was just posting stuff on SoundCloud, little snippets on the guitar, but then [I] started actually recording in a studio with a friend in Canada over the summers. That's kind of how everything came to be.
LUNA: How would you describe your music sonically?
SAGE: Someone described it recently as “quiet confidence,” and I quite liked that. Like, you kind of have to listen a bit closely.
LUNA: Would you say that your music is pretty lyric-forward?
SAGE: Yeah, when I was younger (and now) I started a lot of [songs] as poems, and that’s how I wrote most of the songs. So I do feel like it's always very lyric-focused.
LUNA: I'd love to hear a little bit more about your newest single, “Milk.” What was the inspiration and process like for that?
SAGE: So I watched this documentary called Boys Alone. It’s a BBC documentary — there’s also a Girls Alone one. It was about these kids [who] were left alone in a house for a week, and you saw them form alliances and almost kind of crumble your eyes, and I just found it really entertaining and it made me think back to my childhood. My mom allowed me to explore a lot and get dirty, and so I kind of wrote it with her in mind, too. It's like the filthiness of it, and just wanting to get back to that in a way. It's very nostalgic.
LUNA: Do themes of nostalgia and coming of age come up in a lot of your music?
SAGE: I think so, especially for this upcoming project. There's a lot of that in there — it’s definitely an overarching theme of a lot of it.
LUNA: Will you tell me a little bit more about your new project that's in the works?
SAGE: Yeah, it's about growing up and kind of picking and choosing what you take forward from what you've learned over the years. It's like a reconstruction and deconstruction of ideas. Like, how do you stand now, based on what you've picked up over the years? That's the premise of it.
LUNA: Do you have any prominent musical inspirations, either now or from when you were growing up, that shaped your music?
SAGE: Yeah, I always say performance-wise and world building–wise, Florence and the Machine. When I was younger, she was kind of all I listened to. I'll go to every show just because of the power she holds over a crowd and the way she moves and feels her music. Maybe not necessarily sonic inspiration, but lyrical … performance. I just love her essence on stage.
LUNA: I noticed that dance and movement seem to be central in a lot of your visuals, and I was curious if this is part of your background?
SAGE: It's interesting — that's been said to me before. I took a dance class a while ago but I didn't do very well in it. I've always kind of had the urge to, and I think moving my body to my music, specifically, feels really nice. Almost just because it's something I have to get out physically. It's more of an emotional kind of attachment.
LUNA: Do you have any muses that come up a lot in your music?
SAGE: On the topic of dance, I love the choreographer Pina Bausch, because a lot of that is very emotive. I'm reading a book about her right now. She uses these really sharp movements and everything is driven by emotion and by human connection, and I think that that's something I've been really drawn to. Movement is definitely a big part of the vision for all this as well… And … theater, too.
LUNA: I love that! Were you a theater kid growing up?
SAGE: No, but this is like my theater kid resurrection (laughs).
LUNA: What is your generative process when you start a project?
SAGE: It always feels really funny when I start it because it doesn't necessarily feel like anything. There's always one song or one idea that comes about that ties a bunch of ideas together. So when I'm starting out, I don't necessarily have a clear idea in mind of what exactly I want it to be, but it always kind of finds its way. Once I get that one song that ties everything, then I kind of steer it a bit more. It works that way visually, as well.
LUNA: You mentioned visuals — would you say that you have a certain aesthetic?
SAGE: Yeah, I love to be very hands-on with all of that. My friend and I are making all kinds of paper mache pieces for this project. Like for “Milk,” I have these big hands I made that I use on stage, and we're doing lots of other body parts. So that's what I've been doing the past few months.
LUNA: What are your goals going forward, either with this project or future projects?
SAGE: I was just talking about this with someone the other day, that I think by the end of this project [I want to] just really establish who I am as an artist in other people's eyes, like when they see something [they can say], “That looks like an Abby Sage-esque creature.” So yeah, I think that's the biggest goal: someone seeing something and immediately connecting it to my music.
