Social media and COVID-quarantine can be considered the bane of many people’s existences, but not for the ironic-iconic Salem ilese.
Known for breaking through on TikTok with her smash out single, Mad at Disney, Salem has since created a sonic realm that maintains pop sensibilities, while existing entirely in its own, maximalist universe. Her new EP, (L)only Child only solidifies this theory further, acting as a treasure chest of tracks that were years in the making.
A culmination of Hyperpop influence, mixed with homages to gooey naughties pop, (L)only Child is easily Salem’s most intimate, yet inspiring body of work to date. In light of this amazing release, Happy sat down with Salem to chat about what it means to be a ‘(L)only’ child, how to make Christmas-bangas, and what happens when someone loves dolphins… a bit too much.
HAPPY: So, how’s your day been?
SALEM: It’s been really good! My bearded dragon just had a playdate with a TikTok famous tortoise!
HAPPY: What? A TikTok famous tortoise?
SALEM: Yes… His name is Tiptoe and I brought my bearded dragon, Lil Cow and they had a playdate! It was the cutest thing I’ve ever seen in my life!
HAPPY: Hollup, you have a bearded dragon?
SALEM: I do! He’s sleeping right now cause he’s exhausted from his playdate.
HAPPY: That’s so valid. Well, let’s jump into it… (L)only Child SLAPS! But, it sounds so different to your other recent works and I’m just wondering what you’ve done differently this time around?
SALEM: Thank you so much! I agree, there’s definitely an evolution, but I wrote most of the songs before I wrote Mad at Disney or Coke and Mentos which is so funny to me! Mad at Disney was actually supposed to be just a single I released right before the EP that I already had ready to go and I was so excited, and this was supposed to be released months ago – but then the world had other plans and I’m very thankful that Mad at Disney ya know, did what it did. But overall, I feel like this EP is a bit more mature overall, and darker sonically as well. The production is a little more edgy and quirky in a sense… not to call myself quirky! But, you know what I mean!
HAPPY: (laughs) Yeah! Well, it actually sounds a lot like hyperpop and in that sort of realm – is that something you were trying to draw from?
SALEM: Oooo I love that actually, because I love listening to hyperpop! Honestly, I feel like I’m so dissociated from my music, at this point, that I can never really tell what it’s gonna sounds like. People are always like ‘yeah, tell us an artist that you kinda sound like’, and I’m like ‘you tell me! I can’t tell!’ Just cause I’ve heard all the songs hundreds of thousands of times through all the production process and the mixing and getting the nitty-gritty notes – everything to me feels so familiar that even if I do like, take a chance and do something different, it just sends up feeling familiar by the time I get to play it to other people.
HAPPY: Yeah! I guess as well as songwriting, how did this EP come together? Because the production is definitely unique too.
SALEM: Yeah! Most of the songs were written sporadically throughout the past three years. (L)onley Child was actually written first it was actually a class project, so I went to Berkley College of Music in Boston for two years, and that one was the hardest song to finish ever in my life. It took two full years of versions and rewrites, and I wrote it with my friends. We went through so many different ideas, I think we scrapped five different verses, it didn’t have a bridge until the last few versions we brought in. Another producer on it named Ivan, from Norway, whose a close friend of my boyfriends. Bendik also kinda executive produced the whole EP, he’s not a producer on every song and he’s not a writer on every song, but I always play things for him and he always gives his feedback and kinda makes it really cohesive which is super nice. The rest of them were mostly sessions randomly that I did in LA with anyone that would write with me. I came out here when I was 19, and just threw myself into any session that would have me! I got lucky in a few of them, and for songs like Romeo & Juliet, and good, not great, I kinda didn’t really think I was writing for myself at the time, I was just writing a song for that day. But then I kinda lived with them, and I was like ‘oh no, I wanna keep this and release it’ so, I reached out to the collaborators and was like ‘hey guys, can I keep this and put it on the EP?’ So, that’s kinda how it came together and I’m lucky because the collaborators are the sweetest people. It all kinda came together very sporadically, but for some reason it feels very cohesive to me.
HAPPY: Yeah! It’s funny that you mention Romeo & Juliet cause while all the songs slap, that is by far my personal favourite!
SALEM: Thank you so much!
HAPPY: I love the fact that you’ve got this balance of happy, but incredibly tortured at the same time!
SALEM: Yeah, that one came out of a really funny session! I wrote it with my friend Evan Voytas, and we’d worked together a handful of times before, but that day we were just on another level of weird. That day he showed me a documentary – we hung out for like two hours before actually writing, as I do with most of my in-person session cause everyone’s so fun to talk to – but he showed me a documentary of a guy that fell in love with a dolphin.
HAPPY: (laughs) No!
SALEM: It’s truly crazy! He fully fell in love with this dolphin, and he was just talking about how they were apparently in love, and then the dolphin passed away, and it was this like, tragic love story. And then, immediately after, we wrote Romeo & Juliet in an hour. SO that’s the inspiration I guess… it was a great time!
HAPPY: I hate to get into the nitty-gritty, but like, did he…?
SALEM: YES! And there was an animation that I can never un-see. Actually, I’ve forced so many people to watch it because I want them to join my misery of having seen that! So I came home and I showed all of my friends and roommates immediately after. I didn’t even show them the song, I just showed them the documentary. I was just like ‘guys, I wrote a really cool song today… but you’ll never believe what I just saw!’… and now you get to watch it too! I’ll send you the link!
HAPPY: Please do! I wouldn’t love to see it, but I think I have to now… for research purposes.
SALEM: You’ll listen to Romeo & Juliet in a very different way.
HAPPY: So, can I just clarify for the record… Romeo & Juliet is a soulful song about heartbreak… but also about wanting to fuck a dolphin.
SALEM: Yes! You can quote that! Also, my dog just walked in – you get to meet Bowie!
HAPPY: Oh my god he’s so cute!
SALEM: Yeah, but he just knocked out one of my earphones! But yeah, this is never-before-seen!
(Bowie continues to headbutt Salem)
HAPPY: God there’s so many firsts! Alrighty but back to the EP – you’ve mentioned that you collaborated with a lot of people throughout this EP, and you’ve mentioned a bit of heartache and maturity that’s gone into this EP. How did you make this shift in songwriting?
SALEM: All of the songwriting sessions were pretty different, honestly. Yeah, I tend to start from concept, just like a cool lyric or idea that I have. Love and heartbreak is obviously one of the easiest things to write about, because it’s one of the most prevalent feelings. It’s like the easiest feelings to recognise, and I feel like there are less happy songs than sad songs, because when you’re happy, you don’t really need to talk about it or dissect it – you’re kinda just happy. But whenever you have a feeling of discontent, you wanna just perseverate over it, and figure out ‘Why am I unhappy?’ ‘How can I fix it?’ ‘What’s the root of the problem?’. So, whether it be heartbreak, or anxiety, or you know, a nervousness about a state of the world, all of those things are kinda seen in my writing because that’s what I’m feeling in the moment. Whenever I’m just happy I’m not gonna talk about it, I wanna just enjoy it.
HAPPY: Are you gonna write another happy song at some point?
SALEM: Yeah, I feel like Coke and Mentos was probably the closest I got to a truly happy pop song, but I don’t think I really have too many after that… (Laughs). I’m trying to think of my upcoming releases, and I’m thinking ‘Do I have a truly happy song?’… not as many! Yeah, that’d be a cool challenge for a writing session to just write the happiest song, without it being cheesy!
HAPPY: Or you could lean into the cheese factor? Do you like cheesy music?
SALEM: Oooo, it depends on the type of cheesy. Some people – I would never say this but – some people think that early 2000s pop on the more cheesy side, but I think it’s brilliant, and so well written! I think if anything is well written, I’ll listen to it! I don’t care about genre, I don’t care who’s singing it – if it’s a really well-written song then I’ll appreciate it fully.
HAPPY: Well then, what’s the best pop song of all time, do you reckon?
SALEM: Oh! Toxic is so good! Toxic by Britney Spears is just a work of art. I still reference that song in sessions all the time, it was the inspiration track for one of my older tracks, Roses to His Ex. We used the kinda Toxic string-vibe. Yeah, she’s timeless and that music is so good. Really anything written by Max Martin in that era is so good! I Kissed A Girl by Katy Perry, iconic! (laughs).
HAPPY: Well, what other projects do you have coming up? You mentioned something before?
SALEM: WELL I have so much unreleased music. It gives me anxiety all the time because I just wanna release an album of 200 tracks just to get it out in the world. I don’t know why I get so worried when I’m sitting on so much music that someone’s gonna release the same title or the same concept before I can. But, I have another project coming out, hopefully before this summer. I can’t really say too much about it, but I’m very excited for it – especially one of the songs that we’ve been working on today. It’s very much a summer-bop type song, with lots of energy. The next project will be really fun to perform live, as will this one, but especially the next one.
And I always really wanna do a little Christmas something over the holiday season. I don’t know why, I love writing Christmas music, so does my boyfriend who I work with a lot. It’s just like a weird hidden talent of ours, but we just always come up with Christmas concepts, in June, which is the perfect time! (laughs).
HAPPY: Hold on, but what goes into making a Christmas song?
SALEM: Ooft what goes into it? Really, we just have to write it so early on. We have to write them in the spring in order to get them released in December, or we write it a full year in advance. But, we always have live drums, there’s always lots of piano chords, key changes – this next one has four key changes. So, we’re really excited and terrified to perform that one live. It’ll be a full Mariah Carey moment. And a children’s choir! There’s a children’s choir on every Christmas thing that we’ve ever done!
HAPPY: Hollup so this is fully happening?!
SALEM: Yup! I have one for sure for this year in development! But, I’m hoping in later years to do a full-on Christmas thing.
HAPPY: That’s gonna fucking slap!
SALEM: Thank you!
HAPPY: A bit of a tangent but it is very interesting. Mad at Disney went viral on TikTok and that was how a lot of people discovered you. How does it feel to have gotten such a hectic platform through such new social media?
SALEM: It’s really cool actually! And wild, because it happened over quarantine, so my life changed so much on my phone and on social media, but really not at all in person. Yeah, it’s still kinda surreal for me. I have my first meet-n-greet on Saturday in Venice in LA, I’m doing a little cereal truck, cause I have my cereal brand from the EP… so I’m gonna get to like, give out cereal.
But, I’m still under the impression that literally no one will show up, because I can’t wrap my head around the fact that I have fans. It’s just so foreign to me, because I’ve never done a show for my fans or anything. It’s all just been communicating online and over DM’s. Last night someone recognised me in public for the first time, and I just could not stop talking about it for the next… I was still talking about it all day today. I was like ‘someone actually knew my music’ (laughs). It was so funny!
HAPPY: Yeah! Cause you’ve got like a stan-level fanbase now!
SALEM: Yeah! They’re so sweet! They do photo edits of me and call themselves ‘The Little Cows’ after my bearded dragon. It’s the cutest thing ever!
HAPPY: But that’s weird that you haven’t played a lot of shows?
SALEM: Well I did, but only to bars full of like ten people. Most of them were friends that I’d like literally paid to come, or drunk strangers.
HAPPY: Are you nervous about performing for more people though?
SALEM: I’m so excited! I have a band that I’ve been working with since college. We all met there and moved out here together. When I first moved up to LA, you need a manager to book shows here, but I really wanted to play. So I made a fake management account, and I would email venues with the alias ‘Ben Richard’ cause my boyfriend’s name is ‘Bendik’ – so ‘Ben Richard’ is what we came up with. Then one of them was actually like ‘I need to get on the phone with you to discuss the logistics’. So, my drummer, Jacob, pretended to be Ben Richard and booked a gig for us. So, I’m very happy that I don’t have to do that anymore. I’m glad that I have people helping me with the booking of things. But yeah, we really can’t wait to be on-stage.
HAPPY: In that case, what’s one thing about (L)only Child that you want people to take away?
SALEM: Oh great question! Honestly, I hope they take whatever they want from it. I feel like this project works in a few different ways. It works for someone who listens to music just for the pleasure of listening to something, like easy listening, if they wanna listen to a pop project hopefully I can give that to them. But, the way I listen to music is that I like to lookup the lyrics on Genius, and kinda read along to everything with headphones in a quiet space – really appreciate it. So, hopefully, those that listen that way, can learn a bit about me and my views on the world. I feel like this EP is really autobiographical in that sense. If you listen to the lyrics, you’ll definitely get to know me better.
HAPPY: Shit, well put!
SALEM: (laughs) Thanks! Good question!
HAPPY: Thanks! Lastly, I think we should ask, why is it called (L)only Child?
SALEM: Yes! So, kinda by accident to be honest. When I came up with the concept of (L)only Child, I wanted to write a song called ‘Only Child’ and I thought of that, and then the day after Tierra Whack released a song called Only Child. I was like ‘oh dang’ now I can’t do that, cause she’s a queen, and I would never release the same title as her because that would be embarrassing for me.
So, I was tryna figure out, how can I spin ‘Only Child’. And then I thought ‘Oh, ‘Lonely’ and ‘Only’… that definitely could be something’. And then I realised it was perfect! We just do the ‘L’ and then ‘Only’ and it’s ‘Only Child’ but, you know, also ‘Lonely Child’. So, thank you Tierra Whack for making me think a little more about my title (laughs).
HAPPY: Well, that wraps up everything I wanted to ask on my end. Is there anything else you wanna add-in that you think is important?
SALEM: Ooo, I don’t think so? Just that anyone reading this or listening to this, thank you so much, your support means the absolute world to me, and lemme know if you like the EP. Also, send me dog pictures on Instagram!
HAPPY: Or bearded dragon pictures?
SALEM: Or bearded dragon pictures yes. I do dog of the week though, because for the longest time my Instagram bio has been ‘send dog pics’ and then Mad at Disney blew up, and then I ended up getting hundreds a week. So, now we have a ‘Dog of the Week’ thing that I do on my Instagram story (laughs).
HAPPY: One more question then, how do you decide dog of the week?
SALEM: It’s really hard! I go through every single dog picture, and I just go with whatever one really speaks to me. It also helps if the sweet person who sent it has a nice message or something. That obviously gives points, but it’s the hardest decision I have to make every week!
HAPPY: Valid. Well, thank you so much for chatting to me!
SALEM: Thank you so much! Have a good day!
