We spoke with singer-songwriter Shayfer James during his Shipwreck Tour about his inspiration, his collaborators, and his aspirations.
After our time well-spent at the Rochester, N.Y. leg of singer-songwriter Shayfer James‘s Shipwreck Tour (featuring opening acts Sarah and the Safe Word and Bellwether Breaks), we got the opportunity to interview Shayfer about a great many aspects of his professional career as a musician. The questions we posed got some wonderfully eloquent and thoughtful answers from the artist, and they provided to us some key insights into his process, goals, and even some of his dreams.
Where do you find the most inspiration for your songs?
Shayfer James: In my life? Everyday things. I find it could be a very odd thing. It could be someone you know, a stranger looking at another stranger in a specific way, that gets my brain going. Something sort of just happens. So it’s difficult exactly to describe, and I just say, life. And because I see someone I just sort of drop in and then I write them and that’s it. You know, there’s not a whole lot of time or specific things I do to write about my life sometimes. I don’t know what a song is about until it is finished. It’s probably a pretentious answer, but that’s the truth then.
Shipwreck has this overarching spoken narrative woven into it. What meaning does it seem to convey to listeners?
Shayfer: Great question. So, I was trying to tell the story of myself. So I was thinking of myself as a shipwreck and people as shipwrecks and all of us in various stages of journey and brokenness and treasure. And I wanted to convey that. And I didn’t know the narrative is clear in the way that I structured the songs. And I wanted it to feel like a journey through a very, very specific time of my life. Fundamentally, you know, the last five or six years. And I really do feel like it sort of developed as a narrative and you saw what was happening and where you understood what was happening is fantastic.
In 2019, you worked with Kate Douglas on The Ninth Hour, a musical performance based on the epic poem Beowulf, that took place at the Met Cloisters in NYC. With a full album coming out for the musical fairly soon, we are super excited to listen to it. How did you come to the decision to adapt Beowulf for the stage as a musical?
Shayfer: I met with Kate, so I was performing at Sleep No More, which is an immersive theater experience in New York City, pretty well known at this point. I was doing the aftershow there and for a while, I did an episodic aftershow, so I sort of like I would hire actors and dancers to do real stories around the seven deadly sins. And Kate was my contact. She was an artist in residence at. She saw me performing and asked me to perform at one of her theatrical productions also at Sleep No More, we’re in there and know they have a stage sort of upstairs by the roof. Anyway, she asked if I would want to work on something. And so we met and she drew tarot cards and we decided that we wanted to work on something epic. And I happened to be reading Seamus Heaney‘s translation of Beowulf at the time, and we wanted to do something that was public domain so we wouldn’t have to worry about getting rights and clearances. And I said, Well, I had it in my bag and I took it out and asked, “How about this?” And that’s how we did it.
In preparation for this interview, I recently watched another interview with you on YouTube from about 12 years ago or so, from WDHA Radio in New Jersey, just around the release of the all-new album, which is. If you could give your 12-year-younger self any piece of advice about your professional career as a musician, what would it be?
Shayfer: Oh man, I feel like I’ve learned it the right way. So I kind of wouldn’t want to plant the seed, you know, but… Things aren’t precious. But you can adapt and you can mold your art in any way you want to and, you know, taking input from others, collaborating with others. And it’s so important for growth. And just roll with it. I feel like that’s what I’ve done and maybe just I guess I need to lighten up back than that. Hmm. So I’d say pal, lighten up a little bit and stop taking yourself so seriously.
If there were any active artists or bands you’d want to collaborate with on new material, who would they be and why?
Shayfer: Oh, I think I would go there with a songwriter. And, you know, because I, you know, this is the music that I love so much. But at the heart, I think songwriting is a beautiful craft. And I respect songwriters and I love to write songs on my own, and I also love to collaborate. And you asked earlier about what inspires the music. And when you sit down to write a song in collaboration with someone, there’s a whole different set of rules and a whole different number of things you have to think about. So I guess I mean, I think that Brandi Carlile is one of the greatest songwriters of the last 20 years, and every record she puts out is beautiful. There’s a certain nuance to her writing, but also the themes are so universal that they’re just so well-crafted. They’re absolutely masterful. So I’d say, I think that, yeah, if somebody would be like, right now you need to write a song with somebody, I would probably choose her because I think that would be a pretty amazing experience.
Back in 2019, you spoke to the website AllAccess and told them you’d love to have a song of yours be the opening theme to a television show. Do you have any shows you’re currently watching and what are they?
Shayfer: Oh yeah, let’s see. I just rewatched all of Succession to prepare for the new season, which I think is absolutely brilliant. Um, and Yellowjackets. And, oh, Severance. I’m really excited for that to come back. That’s amazing.
As the Shipwreck Tour is just beginning, what are you most excited about with regard to the tour, and what makes you the most nervous about it?
Shayfer: Um, I’m most excited to get to know the songs in this format, the new songs in this format with these two and the folks that are playing with new Sam [Freeman] and Kienan [Dietrich, both of Sarah and the Safe Word]. We just we had six hours of rehearsal in Atlanta, and then we play the shows, you know, So this is the third show. So getting to know the songs in a live format is always really exciting. So again, even tonight it felt playful and it started to feel a little bit different. And it pushes you to tell the story in a slightly different way. And so it keeps things fresh. Most nervous, I guess, it’s keeping focused. You know, a month on the road it’s keeping positive, you know, even if it’s the best tour ever, it’s tiring. I’ve got this great tour manager who’s driving with me and helping me do merch and certainly wouldn’t be able to do all this stuff by myself. And so, yeah, I think it’s just, you know, cruising through it and like what I did with the last tour with Will Wood, you know, just sort of cruising through it in a positive way and making the best of it. And not getting hung up on the things that might go wrong because things will always go wrong.
So speaking of cruising along, we’re actually at the last question. What are your plans for music after the tour concludes?
Shayfer: Well, um, I’m going to rest. I’ve been traveling for six months. I will be traveling in six months at the end of the last year. The rest and for a week. And then I’m going to go back to the studio and start work on the next album. Um, and with the same producer, that we’re going to bring now as we experimented with using electronic sounds more. And that was really just the two of us making an album and a couple of guests. I’m excited to bring my longtime friends and partners back in. Now we’ve got an experience with electronic sounds now and I’m very excited about that. And The Ninth Hour, obviously that second EP, the full album will be out in August and I plan to do some select tour dates with Kate, just she and I, to play those songs and then start planning for 2024. Yeah, so that’ll be, you know, get back to Europe and the UK and maybe not tour like this one because there won’t be a new album, necessarily, but it is coming back, you know, going back to Chicago and select city stuff, just to keep out there and keep playing. So it’s perfect timing.
We wholeheartedly appreciate Shayfer taking the time to let us interview him, and hope that the Shipwreck Tour, which is still going strong throughout the rest of April, goes swimmingly!
You can find Shayfer James’s latest album, Shipwreck, on Spotify now!
