Emily Richards

By Alex Teitz

If you haven’t heard of Emily Richards by now, wake up. Emily Richards is headlining the Club MP3.com Tour a nationwide tour of local and national artists. Richards is a common name on the pop/rock charts of MP3 with songs from her album, You Give . For more information on Richards go to http://www.emilyrichards.com or more information on the Club MP3.com Tour go to http://www.mp3.com

FEMMUSIC: Can you describe your songwriting technique.

ER: I don’t really consider it to be much of a technique. Most of my songs I write in under ten minutes. I write the words, music, melodies all simultaneously and it’s usually based on a burst of inspiration, and then I just sit down and it comes out and that’s it really….It’s like I go to some other place. It’s hard to describe.

FEMMUSIC: I was surprised to read that you were a CPA, and had to leave music for a while. Could you describe that period of time in your life?

ER: Yeah I was studying music and dance at the University of Utah and I got in a car accident, and I had a pretty serious back injury from and it put me out of both programs ’cause I couldn’t dance and I couldn’t sit at a piano for very long. At first I couldn’t at all.

I had to take so time off. Re-direct my education and so I choose accounting. God knows why. ‘Cause there weren’t very many women and I viewed it as a challenge. Then graduated in accounting, took a job as a CPA with Price Waterhouse did that for a little while and then came back to what it is I love.

FEMMUSIC: Tell me about “Little Annie’s Song.”

ER: “Little Annie’s Song” I wrote for my little sister. She’s gone through some pretty difficult times. My parents just got divorced after being married for thirty years and her boyfriend was killed in a car accident all kind of in the same small window of time, and it really was hard for her. I wrote it basically as a message to her that I still believe in her despite all these really difficult things. It’s okay that she’s screwing up because of that.  

FEMMUSIC: Tell me about “Defeated.”

ER: “Defeated.” Oh! That’s a tough one. I was in a pretty serious relationship with someone and we were going to get married and some things came to light that didn’t work. It’s pretty much just laying it all out there.

FEMMUSIC: I noticed with the CD that you decided to make that a late addition.

ER: Yeah I wrote it a couple days before we were going to master. That recording is literally the first time it was played and it was the first take.

FEMMUSIC: Wow!

ER: No punches. Nothing. I hadn’t even come up with the ending yet. I made it up right there. There’s something about it. It just felt like it needed to be there.

FEMMUSIC: Tell me what your opinion is of what MP3 & Napster’s effect has been on the music industry?

ER: I think I have a different view than a lot of artists. I think they’re both positive. I think a lot of the problem is the record companies fear things they don’t control. When VHS cassettes came out and the movie industry thought no one would go to movies ever again. Obviously all that’s done is create a huge growth for those companies.

Just the more ways you can hear music, that’s just more exposure to more people. Some of my songs are on Napster, while I don’t get paid for that, but that’s somebody who has the opportunity to hear my music that wouldn’t have otherwise. And if they really like it then maybe they’ll go buy the CD.

MP3.com has made all the difference in the world for my career. I compare it to if you were playing basketball. It seems before there was the NBA and high school, there wasn’t really a college league, and that’s kind of what MP3 is. It’s equivalent to that just because it’s a place where people can hear your music, you have charts which is competition. I can sell CDs for a very minimal cost. I get paid for downloads. That’s why I’m on this tour is because of them. I’m pretty appreciative. (laugh)

FEMMUSIC: What would you like to see changed most about the music industry?

ER: I hope that this change is going to force the larger record labels to maybe evolve a little bit and realize that…It’s a difficult thing because they have to run their businesses as businesses. They’ve gotta be able to make money, and answer to their shareholders and so forth but artists really don’t have control of a lot of what they do. They don’t make money until the labels have recouped all of their costs in the beginning.

The record label that I’m working with right now is trying to do more of a partnership kind of like MP3. I just hope that they kind of see that artists and listeners need more of a choice. If you listen to the radio, the playlists are really short and very controlled and what’s played is what these major labels send to the station. They don’t even really have that much of a choice. Most stations don’t even have the choice of trying to break an artist if they wanted to. And that’s what cool about the internet is people can actually go and find something on their own.

I’m hoping that we’ll see a change and the two will meet somewhere in the middle. It’ll be better for everybody. That’s what I hope.

FEMMUSIC: As a woman in the music industry, have you been discriminated against?

ER: I wouldn’t really say discriminated…I think a lot of times, just because, generally, people are used to a women in the music industry just being a singer and so a lot of times people are shocked by, “What you write your music!”, and I play the piano my whole set. I play pretty intensely, and I think a lot of times it surprises people. So maybe people don’t take me as seriously right when I walk in the door because I’m young and I’m a woman. That’s a little bit unfortunate, but I don’t get upset about it ’cause I know that’s what people are used to. I’ve found with producers, musicians and studios all it takes is for me to get in there and I get going and immediately they treat me with respect.

FEMMUSIC: What advice would you give to an artist just starting out?

ER: Most importantly just write great music, and work on perfecting your own craft because all the other stuff just doesn’t matter if it’s not true, and if you’re not really working hard. That is a lot of of hard work. It really is. You just don’t throw your music on a MP3 and everything falls in your lap. It has to be something that you really love and are willing to do a lot for. I gave up a lot. I sold a house, left a career, moved to a different state, left my family, left everyone I know to do this. It’s really got to be like a fire burning in you. Which it is for me. You’ve got to surround yourself with people that believe in you because you can’t really do it by yourself and then take advantage of technology and do great recordings.

Is that too much advice? (laughing) There’s a lot. It’s like golf you can’t just say grip the club right. There’s so many little parts.