Tanya Iyer is a Montreal-based singer-songwriter and violinist born to Indian parents and raised with Indian music and dance lessons. She went on to music and psychology at Vanier University in Montreal, and by the time she graduated in 2017, she had already released her debut album. Do you dream?previous year. An immersive collage of spiritual jazz, experimental pop and ambient folk, more fully realized in Polaris in the 2020s. Kindnesswhat Iyer and her band continue to focus on their latest LP, Tide/Tie. They released the EP, restIn 2022, the five-year gap between albums gives the new collection a different kind of gravity, and the group, including co-producers Pompeii and Daniel Geranas, cleverly weighs. It’s agitated, swirling antidote, but it’s also a rare kind of therapeutic, jazz-inspired, mentally hearted music that circles the journey around them and doesn’t skip towards the mantra enough to paddle uncertainty and pain. “What do we do when we can’t breathe?/I’ve forgotten what will happen, how to feel free,” she sings in “low tide.” Riding with this group of people with emotions brings her closer to the future, far beyond our immediate vision.
We catch up with Thanya Iyer for the latest edition of the Artist Spotlight series and talk about healing through music. Tide/Tieher collaborative process, etc.
“Where does the energy go?” It felt like a good starting point. Because it’s about how you were traveling through the light and how far you really are from the world. Can I talk to you about that past?
It’s like about waking up on so many different levels. Our own trauma history and the systematic forces of oppression internally and outside the world. I have chronic lower back pain, which affects my mobility. I did everything physically. Last fall, I was on a more treatment path to it. And when I was writing, “Where does energy go?” I was only feeling the weight of the confusion and was beginning to explore the pain at the therapeutic level. And I have noticed that things like immigration, colonialism, racism cut the boundaries of families for generations. Suddenly, we see so many mystical pains and illnesses in many Bipok generations, so exploring the pain was to realize that exploring the pain might be deeper than having a lower back tension. I feel the story and try to embrace it. But what we’ve started to awaken is really the weight inside and outside it, and we’re just starting to realize.
When did your relationship with music become therapeutic?
Through everything, music has always been a place for this place to be, heal and process. I think I forget when things are thick and how it attracts us together and why it’s so important that it’s so important. Before the release began, did you feel like “How lucky we are”? I was talking to Pompeii and Daniel. [Gélinas]my band and I were like, “We were lucky enough to be able to play and experience that energy in the room with people.” I just feel that hope and the power of art.
Have you had a period of doubt or disconnection since the release of your previous album?
Hundred percent. Many of this albums were writing songs every day for two months through me. And I don’t know if it’s not giving me permission or if it really stresses me out, but I continued to push album releases, shows and touring. And I was just like, “I can’t push things anymore.” Then I applied to school and did a music therapy program. And I have no regrets at all. I’m so glad you explore that part of me. I always knew what I wanted to do, so I didn’t expect it to happen soon. But it was a very strict program trying to teach all these other things I was doing because I was trying to do my own music and I was trying to teach them lessons. It was so much, and I felt like my personal music practice – leading to creativity that I wasn’t in the band or in the world – was a little bit dropped aside. I remember recently that this album came from a commitment to its creativity every day. Releasing the album definitely helped me integrate some things for me.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntr3pojmptc
Was there any point that made you feel like this song’s collection was moving in a more cooperative direction?
It was always really supportive of the band. Usually I bring a song skeleton and we shape it together. And I think because of the pandemic, I had time to explore my vision of what the song is. I was just in the room, playing six violin and viola tracks on the songs and arranged them. So it was really fun to explore myself and other parts of my interests and bring these ideas to the band with a more fully run-in vision. It’s like learning we are constantly growing, changing and trying to adjust it into our highly cooperative space.
When we produced the album, Pompeii, Daniel and I recorded a bed track for two weeks and enjoyed the songs in this apartment for another 12 days. It was very supportive.
Do you have any details or memories that stand out to you when you see the song come back to life like that?
There are one of the things I found fun: “Can I grow something that I can’t see from here?” At one point, Pompeii placed the gate on my synth, the gate was attached to Daniel’s drums, and then we took the drums out and thought, “Wow, the Prophet sounds so cool in this vibe.” I was on a computer working on music and there were all sorts of small surprises. I tend to be in camps “more fun” when it comes to overdubs – putting all the ideas there – but it produces a lot of work after the fact that it takes many forms. “Low Tides” was one of the songs we had so much material and really had to create it. There were lots of small fun things.
In “High Ties,” you sing, “I want to write easy-to-read words.” Many lyrics bump into me as having that directness, but words aren’t always easy sing. There is a subtle beauty in the way you bring not only your voice but other voices into the song. How has your relationship with your voice developed over the years?
I started playing the piano and classical violin. I did classic South Indian songs when I was younger, but with this style of music, it wasn’t in the formal way. I just started my vocal lesson towards the end of the lesson. I realized that my voice has changed dramatically. If you’re listening to our first album, it’s very different to hearing me. I really feel this: the more you sing, the more muscles you get. This was also the first album to spend a lot of time in the studio creating vocal tracks. In my last EP it was like “It’s okay, great” and we recorded it pretty quickly in one day. But here we spent a lot of days on it and I feel like it’s made it easier to sing everything. I learned a lot about the preparations needed to come across the studio out loud.
One of my favorite moments on the album is in “Wash It All Away.” This prayer retreats the music and flows outwards. What do you think in the quiet waves?
As someone who does a lot and does a lot, as I’m sure I’ve noticed on the album, the quiet waves feel like the breath we’re together, even when we play it. On stage, if I feel I can take as much time as I need in that space and don’t have to hurry and find something, it gives me a lot of energy and confidence. These silent spaces have a bit of strength to breathe, whether alive or in their place.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3cokv9and4
What else will help you keep grounding when you play or write songs?
I’m still learning what helps me. Slowdown is definitely one thing, but if you’re feeling pressured in the songwriting process, it usually means something is not being taken care of, so you’re not pushing through and admitting that you need to switch what you’re doing or try something else. Even in the show, if something isn’t working – we tend to improvise a lot of improvisations on stage and the arrangements take different forms, so it’s nice to try something new. It brings excitement to me and can even change any arrangement to the band. I really like when it happens organically in bands – when we play a lot on tour together, we start reading the vibes, and when you let things go, magical things can happen.
The final track, “Waves/Hold/Tied,” is naturally divided into three parts. The first part feels like the most vulnerable moment on the album. It could have been an opener, but it’s reconstructed by linking it to the other two parts. Why was it important to connect these parts? Were they separated at first?
The entire piece feels like an album’s thesis statement. At the beginning of the pandemic, when I was writing little song ideas every day, they were probably three different days a few weeks apart. I felt that these different parts of the story were connected to me, like in the story chapters. And finally we place it – it feels like the main story of the album.
It’s interesting that you bring up vulnerabilities because that’s true. It’s a really sad part of the album. But the third move, whenever I remember that line, “Remember that you are part of something” – I get chills. I got chills when my friend, the choir, sang it on the album. It’s the feeling I always remember and want to be left behind, so that’s how I found my final path.
How did you think of the duality of the album title? Tide/Tiedo you think it’s perfect for a record? Did that meant growing for you?
The album was titled by my friend Blanche. He was helping us apply for fundraising. I told her what all the songs were and she said, “Oh, this is Tide/Tie. “For the past three years, its title has been talking about it on the show. It’s always been thrown through it. Too much.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and length.
Tanya Iyers Tide/Tie It’ll be out on April 30th Topshelf Records.
