@ Little Spiral @ is a Queer, Body Positive,  indie artist from Los Angeles, California. @ Little Spiral @, the stage name of singer-songwriter, Suzanne Yada, blends her love of indie rock, pop, classical, and roots influences with her background in poetry, media, and the internet to create clever piano pop songs for the digital age. 

With an evergrowing Patreon fanbase behind her, @ Little Spiral @ has spent the last three years building an army of demo songs that showcase her raw talents and unique point of view as an LGBTQ+, Body Positive woman. @ Little Spiral @ has just released the single, “Redefining Perfect”, from her forthcoming album, Part-Time Agnostic.

We had a chance to char with Suzanne Yada, the artist behind @ Little Spiral @ as part of our Refrain Interview Series:

Refrain Music Blog: Thanks for taking the time to do this interview. You have a new single out now. Tell us about it? What’s it called?

Suzanne Yada: It’s called Redefining Perfect, and it’s a piano ballad recorded and produced by me, mixed by my friend Case Newcomb.

RMB: What’s the single about? 

Suzanne Yada: I wrote it for anyone who struggles with the person in the mirror, but I especially had the LGBTQ+ and body positive communities in mind. It started with a song brief from a connection of mine who worked in the film industry – a film about self-acceptance was looking for songs urgently. Well, I knew a thing or two about struggling with self-acceptance, being bi and being plus-size, so I wrote this song. The funny thing is, I never submitted it. Perfectionism got the best of me. I played it at my shows instead, and time after time, out of all the songs I’d play in my set, people would come up to me and comment about this song in particular. That’s how I knew I had to put it out.

RMB: You identify as LGBTQ+, correct? Do you feel that has influenced your songwriting for this project?

Suzanne Yada: In some ways, this song helped me come out publicly. I had told family and friends that I was bi, but hadn’t wanted to make my artist project about it. In some ways I still resist being labeled a queer artist, because I feel it can pigeonhole me into a category that my music doesn’t necessarily want to be pigeonholed. But I know a lot of that is in my head. I’m less precious about it, and that was due in part to this song. I knew the message had to get out about really understanding your place in the world, and I knew the LGBTQ+ community needs it intensely. The message that you are perfect, and other people’s definitions of perfection have nothing to do with your own perfection… it’s sorely needed. So I came out as queer at a show in San Francisco, and played this song directly after I did.

RMB: What’s the story on how it was recorded?
   
Suzanne Yada: At first I had this song as a more uptempo indie rocker. I used to love the Violent Femmes growing up, and they have this awesome lofi shuffle beat that I sampled and looped to get the song written. That’s the version I was going to submit to the music supervisor. But another songwriting friend stopped me in my tracks as if I had just insulted her mother, and she said, “No, no, no, that song needs to be a ballad.” Turns out, she was 100% right. I tested it on my audience at shows and they confirmed it. So when it came time to record it in my home studio, I stripped everything down to just piano, voice and bass. It was technically a quick process, but my perfectionism got to me yet again, and I sat on it for a few years before I finally said, “enough is enough” and hired my friend Case to mix it and give it that final polish.

RMB: This is going to be part of a larger album? What can you tell us about that? When it is out?

Suzanne Yada: It’s the first single release from my EP called Part-Time Agnostic, which should be out in the earlier part of 2022. I have a collection of songs that I’ve been working with producers and self-producing. I’m ridiculously excited about it.

RMB: This isn’t your first album, how does this upcoming album differ from your previous work? What can people expect?

Suzanne Yada: I slow-released an EP called Full sentence, and I think the tone and style of the music on the upcoming EP has shifted to be more modern, more unafraid, and in some ways more accessible to a mass audience. The previous EP I worked with one producer for all the tracks, Jon Devoto, who also was the guitarist for a pop-punk band called The Matches. Well, he decided to disassemble his home studio and sold off his recording equipment, many pieces of which I have in my home studio now. I was actually inspired by The Matches’ approach to recording their album Decomposer, where they worked with a different producer for each track, which is unusual. That’s exactly what I’m doing with the new EP. I’ve been working with 3 other producers and having a grand time with it. I self-produced Redefining Perfect, and I’ll ‘ll be self-producing at least one more for the EP.

RMB: Tell us a little bit about yourself. When did you start pursuing music?

Suzanne Yada: I began formal music lessons at age 8 but didn’t start writing my own songs, beginning to end, until I was 18. But I didn’t even consider myself a “musician” or “songwriter,” just a hobbyist, until I was in my 30s, to be honest. “Musician” was never something I even considered putting on my business card until recently. And now that’s all I want to be.

RMB: Who are some of your biggest musical influences?

Suzanne Yada: I love all kinds of genres, but I definitely have my go-to’s in the alt-indie singer-songwriter world of the ’90s, like Tori Amos, Fiona Apple, Ben Folds, Regina Spektor, Sara Bareilles, Sarah McLachlan. Nowadays I’m so into Billie Eilish, Lizzo, and that last Halsey record which absolutely blew my mind.

RMB: What’s the one thing you are most proud of in your career so far?

Suzanne Yada: I would have never in a million years imagined Ben Folds to even know my name, let alone dig my music. But he does, and he does. Ben Folds is a mensch. During lockdown, he was doing a ton of live streaming through his Patreon, where he was reviewing songwriters’ music. There was a ton of talent in the room, and I was honored to play him a few of my tracks, one of which he actually asked me to show him how to play because he thought the piano lick was so interesting. My brain still can’t get around the fact that Ben Folds essentially covered my song for a hot second there.

RMB: If you had to pitch your music to a potential fan in less than 10 seconds, what would you say?

Suzanne Yada: I’m an indie-piano singer-songwriter who likes to write about science, religion, and other weird things dealing with big questions. An even shorter pitch: it’s like if Fiona Apple wrote songs about robots.

RMB: What’s one piece of advice you’ve gotten that you think everyone needs to hear or that has meant the most to you?

Suzanne Yada: Be the youest you you can be. But louder.

RMB: If you could go back in time, what’s a piece of advice you would give to a younger you?

Suzanne Yada: Stop trying to stuff yourself in someone else’s idea of perfection.

RMB: What’s coming up next for your musical project?

Suzanne Yada: Not only do I have an EP coming out, I also will be releasing a live album in 2022 recorded from my online show series called Concerts for Introverts. I’ve been doing online concerts on the first Sunday of every month, and it’s been an amazing way to connect with my fans and grow a little community. I wanted to capture the vibe of my online concerts and also solve the problem of my own perfectionism by just getting my music out there, so I recorded the November 2021 show and will be shaping it into an album that anyone can hear on their favorite streaming platform. It’s also been interesting rethinking what a live album can be, because normally live albums are marked by the audience clapping and cheering. But there’s no audible clapping and cheering in an online concert experience, really. There is the chat box, though, and during my shows I interact with the fans by reading out loud what people are saying in the chat and responding. It’s been that way since Concerts for Introverts began, and I thought it was a great thing to record and put up on Spotify for posterity.

RMB: Anything we haven’t thought of that you want to talk about? Now is the time!

Suzanne Yada: If you want to check out my last EP, Full sentence, and get some behind-the-scenes stories and a couple of unreleased tracks from me, you can go to freemusic.littlespiral.com. Thank you so much!