A phone memo called "Santijam" arrived in an email from my good friends, Tyler Duncan and Theo Katzman. The memo contained an instrumental creation that featured a catchy hand clapping pattern, chords on the keyboard, and an intricate synth sound Tyler had created. I took a listen to "Santijam" and immediately started hearing melodies in my head. Within a few hours, I had recorded several melodies to "Santijam" with my phone and sent a new voice memo back. This process continued (back and forth emailing) for a couple weeks.

At this point, it was February of 2014 and Theo, Tyler, and I were coming up with "nuggets" of music for my upcoming album to eventually turn into songs. I was in Massachusetts and they were in Michigan and together, we were hoping to finish 10 new songs in a few weeks (crazy, right?!). Many things inspired these nuggets: dreams, fears, loved ones, hope, loss, other songs, the rhythm of coffee-making, and the list goes on. "Santijam" was partially inspired by the production on the album, Santogold, thus earning the name, Santijam!

As time went by, our collection of song ideas grew. Halfway through March, Tyler and Theo made the trek from Ann Arbor, Mi to Amherst, MA with a carload full of gear and set up shop in my cozy (and somewhat drafty) apartment, so we could finish as many songs as possible.

Over the course of the following weeks, the songs developed into new ideas and "Santijam" transitioned into "Face the Fire" - a song about the drive inside each of succeed. When properly handled, this fire can be a very positive force, but when abused - it can turn people into really sad or ugly beings. I wanted to capture the complexity of my own ambitions and how they pul me, as well as my intention to channel this drive in a positive way.

Before deciding on "fire" as the entire metaphor for the song, we came up with many ideas that didn't stick, like facing the dragon (sounded kind of Dungeons and Dragon-ey - which is cool, but didn't fit) and firefighters (which sounded super weird when sung). We stayed up late into the night, working out concepts and phrasing, then lo and behold, "Face the Fire" was complete! It's actually now the title track for the upcoming album. And that's the story of "Face the Fire!"