What is your artist name and where are you from?
My artist name is Gala Maria, I am from San Pedro Sula, Honduras and currently based
in Texas.
What genre(s) of music do you tag your music in and what inspires you to create it?
I tag my music as dream pop and jazz pop. I have always loved the way music can
transport you to a different world, and aspired to be able to do that one day. What
pushed me to finally make my own songs was a desire to be seen for who I am, and I
had been hiding the fact that I sang and wrote songs. When I started releasing songs, it
was a bit uncomfortable, but eventually, really satisfying because I felt more understood.
What has continued to inspire me to create and release is the audience saying they find
my songs soothing or calming. That has given me a new purpose.
Can you talk us a little about what inspired your most while creating your track for our ‘Analog Memories Vol.1’ compilation?
Before making “Dreaming,” I was obsessed with the George Harrison song “Stuck
Inside a Cloud.” It was stuck in my head, and the melody influenced the vocal melody in
“Dreaming.” I had also recently come across El Tata, a fellow Honduran musician who
makes dreamy songs. I loved his song “Locos” and I really wanted to work with him. He
produced the song. Lyrically, the song is about my yearning for my fiancé, who was my
crush at the time.
How do you overcome creativity block while doing your music?
I actually don’t experience creative block. What I struggle with is holding back ideas. I
feel like I’m overflowing with ideas for songs, and the work for me is editing, cutting
back, and refining.
What are your goals for next year?
I am hoping to release more soothing and whimsical songs, and continue expanding my
visual portfolio to extend the worldbuilding in my music.
If you could tell a writing/production technique, what it would be?
When it comes to writing, I am inspired by the Latin American poetic movement
creacionismo, from the 20th century. Creacionismo encourages the writer to be free in
their imagination, and utilize nature elements to express imaginative or impossible
things. Sometimes abstract ideas and symbols can evoke a feeling just as strongly as
diaristic lyrics.
If you could change anything about the industry, what would it be?
At the moment, something I find frustrating about the music industry is the model that
relies on TikTok. Audiences become super familiar with a short clip of a song, and use it
for videos, but rarely know the full song, or appreciate the artist behind it. I think this is
getting in the way of audiences immersing themselves in music and appreciating it as
deeply as they could. This also affects the creative side, where a lot of popular artists
are structuring songs so that they do well on TikTok. It feels like permanent decisions
are being made for a temporary circumstance. It won’t age well.
what you like to do outside of music that contributes to your musicality?
Outside of music, I love to read poetry and autobiographies. I love diving into writers’
and artists’ internal life and understanding their work more deeply. Understanding how
they relate to me, and how their experiences contrast from mine, helps me refine my
own artistic approach. I also paint abstract paintings while listening to records, trying to
show visually how songs make me feel.
Follow Gala Maria: https://www.7tapes.com/gala-maria
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