By: Alex Lund
Alex Lund interviews “Folk-Country Critter Music” pioneer, Meels, in this KZSC Exclusive Interview.
This past Saturday, Meels, an up-and-coming Marin County country-folk artist, opened for bluegrass legend Molly Tuttle at her sold-out show at the historic Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco. I was lucky enough to go backstage and interview her before the show, and walk through the halls of the venue that has been graced by the presence of so many rock and roll legends.
Meels is wrapping up her stint touring with Molly Tuttle with a final show at The Guild Theatre on New Year’s Eve and will head back out on the road with another musical legend, Margo Price, in February.
We spoke about her move to Los Angeles from New York City, hometown inspiration, her new “folk-country critter music” era, collaboration with her boyfriend and creative director Henry Pakenham, touring, and our mutual love of Sierra Ferrell.
Her powerful voice paired beautifully with covers of Dolly Parton and Chet Atkins “Do I Ever Cross Your Mind?” and The Beatles “Don’t Let Me Down” as it echoed across a packed house – not something I see too often for an opener. I was excited to hear her latest two singles, “The Wizard” and “Willow Song” and am happy to say they translate perfectly live.
I went home after the show with my first signed Fillmore poster, courtesy of Meels, a pack of “Meels Fan Club” buttons, and the knowledge of a new folk-country subgenre that I quite like.
Thank you, Meels!
Interview Recording
Interview Transcript
A: Hi everyone, this is DJ Alla here tonight at the Fillmore in San Francisco with folk country critter music Pioneer Meals. Tonight you’re opening for the wonderful Molly Tuttle, a fellow Bay Area artist and banjo player! To get us started, can you tell me a little bit about when you first started playing the banjo and when your musical journey kind of began?
M: Yeah, so I started playing the banjo about two summers ago. I just moved from the Lower East Side of New York to LA, and I was living with my grandma in Pasadena.
I’m kind of a nomad right now. I don’t have a home but it’s fine because I’m on the road a lot. So I was hanging out at my grandma’s house and was kind of bored and wanted to learn a new instrument, so I just went to Guitar Center and I picked one up and then I taught myself how to play it.
A: Super fun, did you play guitar before that?
M: Yeah yeah so I started playing guitar when I was like a sophomore in high school, but before that I started playing piano when I was five. My grandma that I live with, she was a concert pianist, so my mom made a point to put me, my twin sister, and my little sister all in piano when we were super young. So that was kind of like the origins of it.
A: There was a pipeline for it.
M: Yeah.
A: And like I mentioned, you’re from the Bay Area, I know you’re from Mill Valley, because we’re from San Anselmo. How did your upbringing in Marin, in such a creative environment and so filled with nature, influence your music?
M: I think it influenced my music greatly. I mean I grew up playing open mics at the Sweetwater [Music Hall] all the time which has such like a rich musical history, and in Mill Valley you’re just like surrounded by redwood trees, and like I grew up like right below Tam like right in the redwood forest, so I think just being out there on my deck just looking at the circle of redwoods,I just spent so much time there in my teens writing songs, and yeah feeling inspired by the nature.
A: Yeah, and you released your first album “Tales from a Bird’s Bedroom” in June 2024 and I know it leaned a little bit more towards Indie folk, and now you’ve started this new era releasing more country-folk type stuff. What inspired that change?
M: Okay so yeah, I put out “Tales from a Bird’s Bedroom” right out of college, so I was writing a lot. I went to NYU music school – Clive Davis Institute. I was writing a lot but didn’t really know what kind of music I wanted to make, and so I wrote a lot of songs, and then when I got out of college I was like “I’m an artist I need to put something out.”
So I actually was connected with two producer friends in Nashville, and I took the songs there, I was like “I want to be there for 10 days and like let’s just make this record, I have these songs” and so yeah! It went great, we made the record, put it out!
And then after my boyfriend and creative director Henry [Pakenham] he was just listening to a lot of classic country, and I grew up on 60s 70s folk, you know, Joan Baez, Bob Dylan…and and my mom was playing like Iris DeMent a lot as a kid. There was some of the country there. But I don’t know…he was just on a wild hare, listening to tons of classic country, and so I just became obsessed. I’ve always been obsessed with the Americana genre, like Sierra Ferrell is my number one girl, love her.
M: And so yeah I think just listening to a lot of the music got me inspired, and I just was writing like crazy and ended up just writing this second EP that’s rolling out right now with Willow Song and the Wizard, and it’s gonna be out on January 30th, and Vultures the third single comes out on January 9th.
So yeah and it’s just opened making this EP that’s coming out. I just sent it to everybody that I could think of and people were loving it, and it opened a lot of doors for me. I started working with my manager Jake at Vector [Management] and then all of a sudden all these agents wanted to meet, and I signed with Chris Hrovat at William Morris. It just, everything kind of snowballed this year, it was just a crazy year. And then I got through Chris all these great opening slots with Molly and with Old Crow Medicine Show and with Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, just like all these legends.
A: I do love the creative direction of this new era, big fan! I love me some 60s/70s country, so I was a big fan of all of the visuals. Can we talk about more artists specifically and visuals that inspired that for you guys?
M: Um so obviously clearly The Wizard video is very Dolly [Parton] heavy.
A: Yeah.
M: That was inspired by…so you know Henry [Pakenham] and I…he’s my boyfriend, but also my creative director, so we’re just around each other all the time. And he just, you know, he’s always ahead of the curve, and was showing me all of these clips from Hee Haw which is an old 70s TV show. And we just became very inspired by the live performances on these variety shows, and so yeah. Like I was watching the Dolly videos of her on the Porter Wagner show and Hee Haw, and we were just like “how can we make this, likeI feel like we need to make this” so I got the wig and we did the thing.
And then we just decided we wanted to continue on that theme of these variety shows, these “live performances” on variety shows because obviously they’re not totally live but… so yeah then the Willow Song video is super inspired by the Muppets obviously. Yeah, love a good puppet. I’ve started I’m kind of a freak about puppets now, I like have a whole collection, I got a possum, a rat, a raccoon, and obviously a couple others. But that was super inspired by Linda Ronstadt and John Denver on the Muppets, who are two of my favorite artists as well.
So yeah, just super inspired by you know the 70s, in fashion and always. So yeah that’s kind of how that came to be.
A: If you had to pick between three and five artists that are your biggest inspirations, which ones would you choose? You mentioned Sierra Farrell, that’s my goat (greatest of all time) . I’ve got a Sierra Ferrell pin on my jacket.
M: All time, all time, yeah definitely Sierra. John Denver I’d have to say, um, Loretta Lynn, Patsy Klein, there’s so many uh, Marty Robbins, I could keep going on too many to choose, Willie Nelson, you know I mean just all of like the legendary legendary classic country.
A: And on your songwriting, you’ve talked a little bit about on stage and during your promo about The Wizard inspiration, can you talk a little bit more about that?
M: Oh yeah, so The Wizard is about my experience and struggles having OCD. I’ve you know been dealing with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder for my whole life, and you know it’s manifested in a lot of different ways. But, I think that song was just me trying to you know poke, not poke fun at it, but just kind of poke fun at myself and make something that can be serious into something that’s just like fun and dancey and light-hearted and digestible. Um yeah, so it’s just kind of, that was just my, you know, try to get those feelings out in song. And it ended up being super fun.
A: I’ve played on my show a couple times! I also saw on your Instagram that you started a series of recordings in national parks.
M: Yes!
A: Can you walk me through the process of that? Because just the thought of recording on a canoe in a national park is pretty insane, so how does that work?
M: So that kind of whole series kind of started on a whim I had a videographer named Etienne [Surette] reach out to me, because we were going through Kalispell with Old Crow Medicine Show, and he was like “I would love to shoot you like I’m thinking of just like a live performance, you know somewhere in nature, maybe in Glacier National Park?” I was like sounds awesome! He’s like “can I take you out in my canoe into the middle of the lake?” and I was like “yes?!” and everybody was with me, the whole team was with me, but yeah he brought a cinema camera out there, and it ended up just being an awesome video. And I sang The Wizard out there.
Then we decided like…I grew up right near, well you guys did too, Muir Woods [National Monument] and so you know, growing up within such vast nature, I obviously feel really strongly about protecting our national parks and making sure they stay protected. So we started this series, and we’re gonna try to hit as many as we can.
A: Which one is coming up next, any plans?
M: We were gonna hit Joshua tree on this round, but things got busy. I think that we’ll definitely try to do that one. I would love to do Yosemite, and obviously Muir Woods because it’s in my backyard.
A: Lots of fun. I also saw you were featured, speaking of Instagram, on the Women in Americana page!
M: Oh yeah.
A: And listed at the top of Holler Country’s 10 Country and America Artists you need to know, you’ve also, as you mentioned, been hitting so many cool milestones as an artist recently. How does that feel?
M: It feels crazy I mean, just nearing the end of the year here, I’m just looking back on like little Meels a year ago and I genuinely don’t think she would believe it. Like what my life is now, I mean, I quit my desk job just over a year ago to pursue music full-time. When I moved into LA, I was like “I’m living with my grandma rent free I might as well just like give this a shot” and the world just kind of opened up. And it’s been a really crazy year, and I just feel so grateful.
A: You mentioned touring with Old Crow Medicine Show and Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, now on tour with Molly [Tuttle] and Kaitlin [Butts] and Margo Price coming up next. Do you have any favorite cities so far? Or any that you’re looking forward to the most?
M: Hmm…I mean I am really excited about tonight.
A: Yeah, it’s pretty big! I saw the poster outside and I was like “whoa that is some pretty big text”
M: I had no idea that my name was gonna even be on the poster until Molly posted about it a couple hours ago and I screamed, yeah so excited, yeah this feels like a huge milestone for me playing this stage tonight at the Fillmore. But let’s see, Kalispell in Montana, it was maybe one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. I’m really looking forward to playing some shows in New York, we’re not doing New York City with Margo but hopefully we’ve got some things in the works to play in New York City, and you know, I’ve got a lot of friends there still from from school and living there so that would be lots of fun.
A: Is there anything you’ve learned while on tour with all these artists or any good advice that you’ve gotten so far on tour?
M: Oh man it’s been so inspiring, because you know this is my first ever tour.
A: Yeah.
M: So it’s been crazy just to try to wrap my head around all of it, I mean yeah touring is you know mentally physically draining, but also like the most incredible thing in the world. I mean every show you play, like you might be so tired and getting sick, but you get onto the stage and you meet so many incredible people that just totally invigorate you.
Let’s see…inspiration, I mean just touring with Nitty Gritty Dirt Band who have been doing this for 60 years. I’ve been the opener for a handful of shows on their farewell tour this year and we’re doing more dates with them in April, um yeah I feel like just being around them I’m soaking up wisdom, just because they’ve been doing this for so long and they’ve really been so welcoming to me. Every time I’m on the road with them I just feel at home.
A: Yeah.
M: And yeah, I just think like kindness in music just does wonders, it really does, like everybody I’ve been on tour with has just been so welcoming, and they’ve invited me to, you know, come and sing with them every night, and that just feels so wonderful.
A: Yeah, yeah, that must be so insane to tour with a farewell tour, to be at the beginning of your career and then see their farewell after 60 years, that’s so insane.
M: Yeah, it’s very powerful seeing you know, just like seeing the crowds too, who have seen them like so many times, and new fans. And yeah they’re non-stop…they’re still putting out EPs and they’re incredible.
A: You’ve also played the Mill Valley Music Festival for two years in a row now, one of those being in the same lineup as Margo Price.
M: Oh yeah
A: Who you’re now gonna open for in February. We’ve already kind of talked about this a bit, but how does it feel to come back to your hometown and play first festivals, and now a venue that basically every Bay Area kid knows is the best venue ever.
M: Oh my god I mean just again like this year has been crazy. Like, yes, I played the festival this past summer. I just feel like I’ve hit so many milestones, and yeah it just, it feels absolutely wild.
A: Yeah, did you get to talk to Margo [Price] at all being on the same lineup? Or was it just ships crossing in the night, and then you just happened to open for her now.
M: Yeah, I mean yeah, it’s funny how all the Margo stuff happened. I mean I’ve admired her forever, she’s been around forever and we we didn’t really cross paths much when I opened, it was actually the first year I did the Mill Valley Music Festival. It was kind of like a fluke, somebody dropped out and they were like “we need somebody to come and play the main stage” which I don’t even know how it happened. Yeah all of a sudden I was playing this giant stage at my hometown festival. Yeah, it was crazy and that was my first ever festival experience. But then yeah like two years later almost, Margo followed me on Instagram, and was seeing my posts, and our teams connected, and now I get to go on tour with her, and I’m so excited!
A: Yeah I’m excited for that tour…hopefully gonna catch her when she comes to San Francisco, but now we’ve just got to get you at Tam Sound Summit, you’ve gotta hit all the Marin music festivals!
M: So I have played it!
A: You have?
M: I played it when I was 17.
A: Oh my god!
M: And they won’t have me back because I’ve played it before.
A: I didn’t know they were strict about it.
M: Yeah I mean, I if they’re hearing this, please have me back, I’m a different artist now…
A: It’s a new era guys!
M: It’s a new era, I’ve got a great band. No but yeah, I played it when I was 17. It was like so early in the day that nobody was there. But it was amazing to play that venue. There’s been so many iconic performances.
A: Sierra Ferrell!
M: Sierra Ferrell! Yeah, I actually have, well you’re not gonna be able to see this in the audio…but I have, my friend Goldie, he shot Sierra at Sound Summit. I wasn’t there but I have, I keep a signed Polaroid from that in my guitar case.
A: That’s unbelievable, I need to take a photo of that later! That’s crazy!
M: For good wishes, but I would love to play Sound Summit again.
A: If Tam Sound Summit is hearing this, bring her back!
M: Please have me back! I’ve tried!
A: Well that’s all I have for tonight! Thank you so much, this was so much fun!
M:Thank You!
This interview has been edited for clarity and concision.