C ME

Hey Celeste! Could you tell me a bit about yourself?

I am a neurodivergent, queer creative from Naarm! I am 21 years old, nearly 22. I’m quite bad at telling people about myself, so I’ll just say that I am very much so entwined in music and the creative arts. My stage name is C ME. It follows my initials, Celeste Morgan Evans, and seems very fitting; see me! I haven’t yet been able to perform live as C ME, but I have had my fair share of live jazz gigs. I am specifically influenced by jazz, soul, RnB, Rap and brit pop-rock music. I listen to all genres, and had a screamo and pop-punk phase for around two years. My jazz phase kicked in right after that, and I fell in love. I always loved pop music, generally 60s-80s pop. Talking about music gets very convoluted for me, there’s so much to say and so much to enjoy. I am interested in a lot of different things, including psychology, philosophy, literature and poetry. I definitely think everything interconnects in a way, so that’s why I guess I’m always asking questions and seeking out the ‘why’s’. I’m not interested in math though…definitely, definitely not maths.

Who are your biggest musical influences?

One of my biggest influences is Billie Holiday, she has an incredible ability in creating atmosphere and emoting the theme of a song through her voice. You can almost feel her life experiences in the songs she sings, it is a powerful feeling, listening to her voice, her life. One of my favourites is a song she wrote called Fine and Mellow, there’s a film clip from 1957, it’s brilliant. Another artist I am indebted to is Robert Smith, lead singer/songwriter from the band, The Cure. A fucking awesome band. If you’ve ever listened to The Cure, you’ll know the juxtaposition between the chimey, light-hearted (very 80s) chords and keys, and the doom & gloom of the lyrics, is something to laugh, cry and dance at. Robert Smith is an English Pop Rock genius. My mother and I love him. I think the biggest icon of my entire life -ever since I was nine years old- is David Bowie. I watched an ABC documentary on him and fell in love. I’m not going to go into it too deeply, but he’s a pioneer, a legend, a true hero and all in all, an inventor. He probably saved my life more times than I can count and just genuinely made me feel like it was okay to be weird, strange, colourful and make people uncomfortable with the unknown.

Where do you find lyrical inspiration?

Everywhere. Generally, love and loss, people and places. Most things give me inspiration. I write about my past and present a lot. I am slowly formulating my way into becoming a writer that can express the future. It would be cool to have all three down-pat. I’d also love to stop writing about pain and angst. That would be nice. 

Who would be your ideal musician to collaborate with, and why?

That’s a very difficult question to answer, I don’t know if I can. Hmm… 

Probably Mark Ronson. He’s a British musician, songwriter, arranger, and producer. I just know I would learn a number of phenomenally useful skills from him. He would certainly open my eyes to a more technically advanced way of writing and thinking.

You've said you started performing at the age of five - incredible! What is your first memory of this? 

I don’t have an exceptional memory, however I do remember performing at a school event when I was five. It was a competition at the school’s annual carnival. I sang ‘Stupid Cupid’ by Connie Francis. A hit track was written in 1958. My mum was a fashion designer and made a fabulous outfit for me, out of bed sheets because they had little red love hearts on them and I thought it fit the song's lyrical tone. I think that was the time when I started really loving fashion and art, music and drama. I was very outgoing and flamboyant as a youngster. I also remember being scared shitless to go on stage. I have always been like that. I have deep performance anxiety, especially before going on stage. Even now, I'm extremely anxious. I seem to get through it without fucking up though, even though I get a big red rash and go to the bathroom about six times before a set. I love, love, love to perform, but I think my body likes to tell me otherwise. I have never let it stop me, I don’t think I ever will.

How would you describe your sound to someone who's never heard it?

I don’t know to be honest. My producer, CharliBlap and I work with a lot of different sounds. We certainly use the traditional pop formation in structuring most of the tracks, but I would say my jazz vocals can be heard in a lot of my projects. I’ve got a lot of new releases coming up, one disco, one blues, two RnB, and a couple of what I like to call ‘groove pop tracks.’ I think because it’s the start of my music career, I’m playing around with different sounds and textures, to see what I love working on- like a taste tester. I believe there is a certain type of darkness to many of the songs I've written. You can hear it in my debut single, stay this time. My other track, CRUSH, has a softer tone to it, it’s sweet, but still punchy. The lyrics have a subtle undertone of cynicism. 

Could you explain your creative process in writing poetry and turning it into music?

I tend to be quite an emotional songwriter. I know that’s a classic musician thing to say, but I do think there are all different types of creatives. Some creatives like to ponder and create after an emotional time period, some like to resurrect feelings for their art, and some like to invent emotions within their pieces. There are so many wild and wonderful ways, and I am more of an ‘in the moment’ artist. I tend to write my poems right in the midst of the chaos. Especially when I am in emotional turbulence, a poem seems to calm and centre me, it helps me make sense of my very overwhelming feelings. Generally, my poems have a slight lyrical sense to them, so it makes connecting them to a song very easy. I then plonk away on my keyboard for a day or a week or a month. Sometimes longer. Songwriting is strange in that way, sometimes you can birth a song in an hour, but sometimes it’s a year. Very strange. My producer calls music magic and of course, I completely agree. Magic is a strange thing.

How have you seen your style evolving over the years?

I know that my voice and my songwriting capabilities are developing into something I am incredibly proud of. I used to have quite a shy and soft voice, probably a lack of confidence and skill level. Now my voice is thick and strong, I am not as afraid of having a presence. I was bullied severely all the way through school, and it was only when I graduated in 2018, that my voice became big. Music is the one thing that makes me happy, even when I feel completely nothing, music brings me back and takes me away to so many wonderful places. It gives me a million different forms of reality. It’s a very cliché sentiment, however, it is true to me. I have never felt more alive than when recording and performing a song I have written.