Interview: Better If Worse With HAFFWAY
Photo by Tyler Kripphane
Interview by Lindsey V. Britt
Nashville based artist HAFFWAY went from piano competitions to producing others to now performing his own work. With his recently released songs “Golden”, “Drunk on Easter”, and Better If Worse”, he just finished touring with Wilder Woods. Next, he will be opening for Sam MacPherson in May, playing Summerfest, and opening for Richy Mitch & The Coal Miners this fall for their EU/UK tour.
You recently released your song “Better If Worse”, what’s the story behind the song?
I guess it's more of a general story instead of a specific one, I found myself in these conversations over and over again with family members, friends, whatnot, where they'd be in a position that wasn't ideal, but it wasn't bad enough to do anything about it, it wasn't bad enough for them to change. And so this phrase kept coming up and it would be better if it was a little worse. and then I applied that to my own life and this song came out of it and in regards to like a lot of little different situations evolving uh religion and mental health, blah, blah, blah. and realizing that I'll be a little bit better if they just got a little worse for a second, so then at least have somewhere to grow off of, you know.
What is your songwriting process like?
My songwriting process, it's a little sporadic. I mainly write in the car while I’m driving. So it's usually on my way to work, I head to the studio to write with another artist, and then I'll write when I'm headed home from the studio. Then I'll usually block out a couple days to kind of start producing out and finishing out the records, but a lot of it’s as I'm going to bed, I'll get a song idea and jump up and start writing it.
What led you to going under the stage name HAFFWAY?
I have a shared note on my phone with a handful of artists that I work with. and anytime we come up with a bad band name, we write it down in the shared note, so there's hundreds at this point, and there's these very successful stout artists that all write these terrible band names and HAFFWAY was one of them. I just thought it was actually kind of cool. So that's where it came from.
How did you get into music and knew it was your calling?
I was a classical piano kid. I was on the Juilliard route, that was the goal, I'm 29 now. did that up until I was 18 and then kind of abandoned ship and went into studio internships because I felt like that would be fun. I thought producers were cool and I didn't know what they did, so I was like I want to be cool, blah, blah, blah. I went and started interning at different studios and did that for about 4 years, interning and learning how to make records. And then I landed back in Tulsa, Oklahoma when I was 21, started a studio there when I was 22 and then ran that until I was 27, right around 27 I started writing for myself. That's when HAFFWAY started showing up. moved to Nashville at the same time that I released HAFFWAY. My wife and I had relocated there about two years ago. but it all stemmed from a little classical piano competitions.
What is it like producing for other artists?
Very different per artists, there's some artists that come in with nothing, you know, they come in with no ideas, no direction, they just come and say, let's feel it out, figure it out, and we start exploring together. Usually, I have like four or five hours or something to write and record a song, and then there are some arts that come in with a verse chorus and a bridge and they just need help with the second verse or something like that. Some artists that I work with, typically the more fluid writers are a lot of stream of consciousness writers, so they'll come down and have a song title or whatnot. Then they’ll just kind of write right in front of me and then I'll help out where the gaps are, that kind of thing. So it's very, very different, I love it.
Is there an artist you’re wanting to work with?
Oh, endless artists I want work with, that'll hopefully be forever as long as I like my job. There's a lot of artists that I've wanted to work with that I've been lucky enough to work with now, you know, get docked in with. The artists that I have not worked with that I want to work with yet. I could talk your ear off, I have a whole Google doc list of artists I want to work with, all the way from Harry Styles to New TV to The Lemon Twigs, kind of all over the place, It’s just anybody that's good at their job, I wanna be involved.
Since you know a lot of incredible artists, is there someone everybody should be looking out for?
That's a great question. there's a handful, so I look out for this kid named Barrett, he’s phenomenal, he’s from Boone, North Carolina, love that guy he’s so talented. Bo Staloch is another one. He's not super under the radar at this point, it's working out really well, but I love him dearly super talented. Cece Coakley is one that I’m a big fan of. This artist in Ireland called Stella and the Dreaming, she's sick, she's got like 700 listeners, never worked with her but I think she's fantastic. Tyler Ballgame is a cool guy, he's so sick. Yeah, I can keep going, that's where I spend most of my time.
Photo by Abi Westhoff
You’re on tour with Wilder Woods, how’s the tour going so far?
I think we have 17 shows left. I have a couple headline shows so I'm flying to Green Bay right now for a couple headline things, but it's going really well. They're a really sweet crew, I feel lucky to be involved, I'm playing guitar and congas with Wilder Woods, which is really funny. The crowds are fantastic, it's a demographic I haven't played for yet, mainly in the like 30s, 40s. and so far, so good. I bet maybe you need to ask them, but I think it's going well.
Is there a place you want to play but haven’t yet?
Endless places. All the places that I'm playing with Wilder, of course, I'm just opening. So, I mean, all of those would be great if I’m headlining, but the dream ones are Cain’s Ballroom in Tulsa, Oklahoma, that’s hometown, you’ve got to headline there. Of course, Red Rocks, Madison Square Garden, you know, I would love to headline The Caverns, and then there's Basement East in Nashville, it’s like a 450 capacity, I'd love to headline that, Old National in Indianapolis would be great. House of Blue’s Chicago, yeah, I could go forever, I would be honored to headline anywhere.
I saw you’re playing Summerfest, are you planning any other festivals this summer?
We’re going to be doing as many festivals as they'll allow us to. That’s the announced one right now, but yeah, Summerfest that's the first festival, I'm looking forward to that, and I'll be playing that with a full band, which will be good. We'll play any songs anyone wants us too.
If you could write a song for any movie what would it be?
That's a great question. You know, what would have been fun? I don't know if this is a good answer or not, but you know that Timothée Chalamet, Bob Dylan movie I think it would have been fun to write some songs that were like in the background of that, That would have been interesting, just to be in the same vicinity as Dylan's music would be cool. I would love to score an entire Wes Anderson film, like he's just my favorite director. So yeah, anything by him, Moonrise Kingdom is like one of my favorite movies ever, I would love to write a bunch of songs for that. Would love to do a Disney movie at some point. I'm a big Roger Miller fan, so doing an old school Disney film would be cool.
Is there anything in the works you want to tease us with like an upcoming song?
We played our headline show in Tulsa, March 23rd, Also I have a single coming out called “Golden” featuring Brent Cobb who’s a hero of mine. Yeah, we’re slowly rolling out an album this year, I don't know if we're announcing that yet, but I guess I am now, so we're slowly rolling out a record, everything else is pretty quiet, like we'll announce them at the right time.
Finally, do you have a recommendation?
I would recommend to read War of Art.
You can stream “Better If Worse” alongside “Drunk On Easter” and “Golden” and the rest of HAFFWAY’s discography now on your favorite music streaming service.
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