What did you do when you were 17? Did you write your own music? Shoot your own videos? Worked two part-time jobs? All while finishing high school? Yeah though so…
Meet Megan Landry. Some magazines already hail the 17 years old Canadian artist as the next Lorde, and there’s certainly an aura of upcoming success around her. She has been playing piano since the age of 4 and writing since the age of 11. She’s wining awards left and right. 50% of the sales from her music go to the charity, World Vision. It seems like this teenage girl put all the puzzle pieces for a successful music career into place, so we wanted to know a bit more and started a brief email exchange with Megan…
Megan, as a 17 year old singer/songwriter from Canada, you have won quite a few awards already. Tell us a bit what it means to be a young artist in today’s diverse music industry and what in your eyes was your biggest achievement.
I used to feel like a little lost fish in a large pond when I first started off, but the more I look at the people around me, the more I’m feeling like I blend in. Artists are getting younger and younger, for example, Lorde is only a few months younger than I am and she’s achieved massive success. Awards are nice but that isn’t what drives me. I think my biggest achievement so far would be my music video “wallpaper.” It’s difficult to plan, shoot and edit an entire music video on your own opposed to paying a company to do it for you. I like that challenge. It took two months to personally pick, choose and contact the models, put together the costumes from thrift stores, design the sets and dissect the footage into the final product. It was worth it though!
http://youtu.be/MNXh0J-8s5Y
You write your own music. You shoot your own videos. With technology today everything gets more accessible and barriers get broken down. How do you incorporate technology into your creative process?
Technology is a familiar friend to many of us, especially for diy artists and bloggers, with no budgets. I use technology all the time for creative inspiration. I’m always on-line, looking at websites such as Pinterest, Google, Tumblr, etc. and love Youtube.
I’ve read that the inspiration behind your song “Wallpaper” comes from staying up late worrying about stuff you can’t change, like global warming, war or cancer. If you would be able to change one thing, what would it be and why?
There too many struggles and so many obstacles that people have to deal with, ranging from discrimination to starvation and everything in between. It weighs on me. If I could fix one problem and one problem only, I would eliminate global warming because it’s bigger than any other issue that we face and it’s bigger than any of us; we cannot fix it, we can only slow down it’s process. That’s scary!
You seem to be well on your way to success in the industry, but if there was no music in the world, what would you do instead?
Music is just one of my creative passions. Although I love music and being a songwriter, I’m also a writer—a poet, and I’m working on a fiction novel right now. I draw, sketch, sculpt, design, etc. too. I work with photography, love photoshop and videography, whether associated with music or not. Overall, writing is probably my number one thing to do though … next to music.
Tell us where we can find you online and are there any new projects in the works?
You can find me at these links: Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, Reverbnation, Instagram & LinkedIn. I always have something brewing. Music wise I’m in the midst of putting together a video for my song “Nose Bleeds”. It’s not released yet, but I attached the final mp3 if you want to share it, that’s okay. I have another new song, “Marathons,” which will be released probably before “Nose Bleeds” because it’s almost finished, but I won’t do a full video for this one too (no time).
http://youtu.be/Nf_7hfA5Pgk
Lastly, do you have a favourite quote or song lyric that inspires you and want to share with us?
There are so many great quotes. This one comes top of mind for some reason today.
“The devil doesn’t come dressed in a red cape and pointy horns. He comes as everything you’ve ever wished for.” — Mac Tucker
It’s important to differentiate the true goodness from the fake stuff and understand who you can trust and who you shouldn’t. It’s a very powerful quote.
Thanks for your time Megan!
