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Maeve Steele floated ‘round to OnesToWatch to invite us into the angelic world of her recent EP, Honeyland. A nuanced songwriter and artist, Maeve Steele winds through themes of natural beauty, loneliness, and the passage of time in this project. Self-described as “Americana-noir,” Steele finds influence in the edgy, ethereal sounds of Lana Del Rey and the literary prose of Joan Didion and Maggie Nelson. The EP bristles with these complexities, presenting introspection in lush layers of live instruments and atmospheric synths. Beginning her career in Nashville as a student at Vanderbilt University, Steele is a storyteller and songwriter at heart, tying insightful observations of life with entrancing melodies. Now embracing her artist identity, Maeve Steele is truly a joy to get to know… join us for a walk through Honeyland, track by track:

Honeyland (intro)

I was humming in the car and “I am not a selfish lover, I’m a selfish love” just kept falling out of my mouth. I liked that it had this almost sea-shanty, Irish folk quality to it. This was the last piece of the project that I wrote, and it felt like my opportunity to introduce the sonic atmosphere and the almost unsettling sweetness of the EP. I’m a stranger in the garden, and this is Honeyland…

How to Run

I wrote this song for my sister. I was thinking about girlhood and sisterhood, how we help each other through the confusing and beautiful and sometimes devastating transition into womanhood. I wanted this song to feel like a group of girls telling secrets to each other. Lyrically, I think it’s my favorite on the EP. 

Strangers in the Garden

This is a song about an identity crisis. I wrote it just before turning 25, which is the first time my age has felt at odds with my sense of self. There’s lostness but there’s also love, there’s boredom and silver linings. I was inspired by Maggie Nelsons’ ‘Bluets,” and this was my own attempt at writing through the color blue. It oscillates between shades throughout the song, an ode to the mid-twenties. 

Lorena

I grew up listening to The Turnpike Troubadours, so I grew up in awe of the enigmatic and badass character Lorrie in their songs. I wanted to tell a story of my own about the fate of the muse, and how we tend to warp women through art. This was really my first time writing a song through another character, so I used Lorrie as a jumping off point for my heroine. 

Arcade

Arcade is the strangest love song ever. I was thinking about how when you grow with someone, when you go through life with them, you shed versions of yourself together. I guess that made me think of death, in the least dark way possible. Arcades and video games felt like a good metaphor for trying all of these different lives with someone, a way to explore the juxtaposition between love feeling eternal and time being so fixed. I love Daniel (Loumpouridi’s) production on this song, it feels really patient, like all of the space is weighted. 

If We Grew Wings / Wings (outro)

The spoken word part of this song terrified me to my core, but I’m so grateful Daniel pushed me to do it. This song started as something I wrote for a friend struggling with addiction. I wrote the poem at the end months after the first part of the song, and I think that distance allowed us to bring so much more depth to it. To me, it turned into a song about family, aging, and nostalgia. I think that’s what Honeyland is all about. 

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