WORDS MAISIE JANE DANIELS - OPENING IMAGE NILÜFER YANYA
Answering our call from Italy, where the local church bells marked the time, we had a chat with singer-songwriter Eli Smart. It was a gloomy day in London, which felt quite fitting as Eli’s debut album, No Summer, is set to drop this September, 6th. A born adventurer, Eli began his journey in his hometown of Kaua’i, Hawaii, then moved to Liverpool to study music at LIPA. He found himself back in Hawaii during the COVID lockdown and returned to London just a year and a half ago. This album perfectly symbolises that journey, exploring how everything contrasts with each other and the notion that the grass isn't always greener.
Eli has a wonderful way of encapsulating his life into his music, whether through the repetition of lyrics that symbolise how some things in life remain unchanged, or through nostalgic riffs reminiscent of days gone by. F Word couldn’t wait to catch up with this rising star to discuss his journey so far, the making of No Summer, and his highly anticipated headline show at the Servant Jazz Quarters in London on July 29th. Eli, we’ll see you there! Buy tickets here.
Maisie Daniels: Hey Eli, thanks for talking to us today! You were raised in Hawaii and now you’re in London- welcome! How long have you lived here?
ES: I’ve come from Hawaii, to Liverpool, back to Hawaii during Covid, and I moved to London around springtime 2022, so I’ve been here a minute!
MD: So not too much of a welcome! [laughs].
ES: I’ll always take a welcome because it’s a big city!
MD: What do you like most about the city?
ES: It’s such a drastically different place from anywhere I’m used to- being from a very small island in Hawaii- so I’m always in awe of what a city is like and everything that it evokes creatively. To walk around and soak up a different environment is so stimulating for my brain. Sometimes way too much [laughs]. I’ve gotten to know my little area where I live (Lewisham) for the last two and a half years, and I love going on walks. I’ll walk up Blackheath Village park and along the river. I love that.
MD: What do you miss the most about Hawaii?
ES: Honestly, I miss my family and my friends. I miss being in the ocean…
MD: You don’t want to go swimming in the River Thames…
ES: [Laughs] No! When you’re in different places, the other place seems like some distant dream that it’s hard to fathom. You miss what you don’t have, so I’ll miss home when I’m in London, and when I’m home, I’ll miss being in London.
MD: The grass is always greener! Speaking of your family, let’s take it back to the beginning... It sounds like music was always in the cards for you.
ES: Yeah! I guess in the sense that it’s what everyone in my immediate family got up to in their own ways, and everybody had their own passion for it. My Grandma and my Grandpa, Mum and Dad, did many different things in their lives, but music was always a constant thing for everybody. Seeing them all pursue it in their own way was a contagious environment to grow up in and something that I always associate with the comfort of family. It’s deeply within.
MD: It’s in your blood!
ES: I guess so! I think it was as simple as music was always around, instruments were always around. It was never imposed upon me but always available.
MD: When was the turning point that made you realise you wanted to make this into a career?
ES: The point was graduating high school on the island I grew up on and realising that if I wanted to go to university… it would be so expensive in the US, and in Hawaii you get out-of-state tuition, so it’s even more expensive. So I didn’t know if that was what I wanted to do, or what the options were, but I found this school online called LIPA in Liverpool. So that was a turning point, realising that if I wanted to continue to do music, it would require making a big change and going far away to do that.
Photography by Nilüfer Yanya
MD: Good on you, that’s a huge change to make. Did you like Liverpool?
ES: I love Liverpool! It was the first place I started an independent version of my life, away from home, so I think that always has a big impact on anyone. Luckily, it was a very manageable in-between, between Hawaii and London because if I went straight to London, it would have been mad [laughs].
MD: Your latest single “How Come” is out now. I’ve had it on repeat, and I love how nostalgic it feels. Talk to me about the ethos behind it.
ES: Thank you! That’s a funny one because it ties together everything we were talking about in the timeline of being home and moving away because I did write it in my junior/senior year of high school, and I just had a super old demo that I thought would live forever. It was one of those songs- a friend of mine was hanging out with me- and I just wanted to write it. So I wrote it quickly and demoed it out, and it was this little time capsule of this little world then, and it stuck with me.
I think I tried to record a couple of different versions of it in university in Liverpool, messing around, but for whatever reason, it didn’t click then until I came back home after Covid happened. It was a full circle of having returned to my old room where I wrote it, after having had these amazing few years away, and then Covid, which seemed like some fever dream that happened. I took another go at it, and that’s the version that I ended up putting out. It’s kind of funny; when I articulate that, it makes a lot of sense to me! [laughs].
MD: It feels very metaphorical for you.
ES: Yeah, that’s the funny thing. Singing the same lyrics over and over again, I’m like, nothing has changed. We still put ourselves through the same old stuff!
MD: What do you think it is about nostalgia that we are so drawn to?
ES: Maybe something to do with the fact that there’s such a vivid feeling that something’s happening, and then in the real moment, you feel the nostalgia as it literally happens. Maybe it’s the realisation that everything is fleeting… I don’t know…
MD: That was a big question for a Tuesday morning!
ES: [Laughs] I love it, though. In Brazilian music, there’s that word “Saudade” (I love Brazilian music), and I think that word- and I don’t think there’s an English translation for it- but it’s a deeper version of the word “nostalgia,” and it's that melancholy realism.
MD: Yeah, and nostalgia transcends into all aspects: music, fashion… and I feel the older I get, the more nostalgic I get.
ES: Yeah, it’s collecting more memories, I guess.
MD: You’re self-releasing your new album “No Summer” on September 6th! The name feels very fitting for England right now. Talk us through what it’s all about.
ES: At the heart of it, they’re songs from my own experience of having the opportunity to live in such contrasting places. Not only just the weather but culturally, the scenery… I don’t think anything could be more different between Hawaii, Lewisham and Liverpool, and that’s blown my head off the whole time. I think these songs have come from that fusion of environments.
[I wrote] “No Summer” when I was in Liverpool, and I guess anywhere outside of Hawaii, people have (and rightfully so) a very picturesque idea of the reality of what it must be like to live in Hawaii, which is a lovely reality on a total level, but real life continues, and it’s not always as idyllic as it seems. I don’t think sunshine solves everything [laughs]. There’s a very deep history there too, and the reality is often glossed over. So “No Summer” is maybe just trying to show how everything contrasts with each other and it’s not always that simple. There’s a melancholy for that; everyone has a nostalgia for summer and “everybody’s always happy when it’s summer.” It’s not a downer, more the opposite. Reality is a little deeper than that, and that’s okay.
MD: Yes! I feel the pressure, and I think: we’re in mid-July, how much fun have I had, how much have I made the most out of the summer so far? There’s an anxiety there, and I guess what you’re saying is it’s okay.
ES: Yes, exactly, I was definitely trying to get at that. I think the expectation of “summer,” and it’s such a loaded word for everybody. If you live in a sunny environment or a non-sunny environment, it’s going to have its own connotation, so I want to highlight it.
MD: Yeah, and by vocalising this through your music, it’ll break down that stigma and make listeners realise they’re not alone in these feelings, which is what is so beautiful about music.
ES: Totally, and I’m hoping so!
Photography by Molly Daniel
MD: If the album was the soundtrack to a film, what would it be and why?
ES: Oh, that’s a good one! It would be somewhere between, wow, Napoleon Dynamite, Pulp Fiction, and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
MD: I’d be up for watching that!
Both: [Laughs]
MD: If the album was a colour, a taste, and a temperature, what would it be and why?
ES: A deep blue- a midnight blue. The taste that comes to mind is this amazing Gelateria shop down here [in Italy], and I’ve been getting two flavours. One of them is called "fior di latte,” which is a really nice creamy flavour, and the other one is peach and mango, and I’ve been mixing those, and it’s been a lovely little treat for the summer!
MD: Sounds delicious!
ES: That’s my brain [laughs]. I’m sorry, I can’t stop thinking about this ice cream.
MD: Temperature?
ES: That would be the temperature of the water back home, which cools you down, but it’s warm.
MD: Is there a track on the album that’s closest to you?
ES: There’s a song- it’s gone through a few names- and it’s called “Another Sundown.” That’s a song that I feel is the most nostalgic song for me; it’s not about any particular experience of mine, but I would park my truck on this beautiful lookout on the east side of my house on the island, and it’s one of my favourite places to sit or write. I came up with the song there, and I will forever associate the song with that, and I think that’s the reason why it’s most important.
MD: Do you have a favourite lyric from the album?
ES: I don’t know if it’s my favourite, but it’s one that comes to mind, and it’s kind of funny.
The first song on this record sets the tone nicely for the world that I wanted to put together for “No Summer.” It’s called “Last Hoorah Echo”- It’s kind of referring to a post-apocalyptic world, and it’s tongue-in-cheek where everything is falling apart, and whether the character is me or someone else, they’re trying to put out tunes and hopefully try to get on a playlist and make a cool music career. And an element of that is true [laughs], and it’s reality, but the first words of that are: “I’ve been saving up my Pantone (I was trying to rhyme), payola for airtime on The Late Show.” So you’re trading in food because it’s more valuable than money to get on a radio show! I don’t know why that came to me, but it’s just a funny little world [laughs].
MD: I mentioned earlier that your album will be self-released. This is off your label “Aloha Soul Disques.” Why did you decide to create your own label?
ES: Many factors! To give the brief backstory: I moved to London because I had a record deal and I was putting out music with Polydor. What happens with a bunch of major systems, your team can let go, and you’re also let go, and that happened. I was in an interesting place of having moved to London to very much be present and working there, and I found myself still there and not wanting to go as I’d met some beautiful people. I figured what felt the best and what was the reality was to continue putting out music on my own terms. I put together my own little team, and the dream is that I put out music with my friends and do stuff with the people that I want to spend time with. If it evolves as a project into something more inclusive like that, that would be awesome! But for right now, I just thought it was the best thing to do my own thing.
MD: I think that’s really commendable! If you could change anything about the music industry, what would it be and why?
ES: Thank you! I guess the industry is always changing more than it ever has been. Music is such a wonderful thing for people to have, or to be able to pursue, and I think we put such an emphasis on whatever being “successful” or “making it” is, and there are so many realities between extreme success and not giving it a go that are totally worthy career paths, and I think it’s important that people feel that those are accessible and get validation for it. Not that that is the goal, but I do think it’s important to respect everybody in the process, at any level, as music at the end of the day is a lifelong thing that hopefully everybody has the option to participate in.
MD: You will headline the Servant Jazz Quarters (great venue!) in London on July 29th. That must be exciting! You seem to really come alive performing live.
ES: Yeah! I love playing shows with my friends. I’m excited to play there- I played there last month- and I had such a good time I decided to book another one almost as a summer residency vibe. I’m really excited as my dad will be flying back from Italy back home, and he will stop in London for a couple of days, so he will be here when we play that. He plays Lap Steel (Hawaiian slide guitar), so he will play with us, and it’ll be a fun time. We’ve all played together before; my mates and him, so it’s cute! We will be playing a couple of support shows with my friend Declan McKenna two nights before that, so it’ll be a nice little weekend!
MD: Amazing! Love Declan, and we featured him back in the day on F Word magazine, and it’s been special to see how incredible he’s doing. How did that come about (supporting Declan)?
ES: We’ve been friends for a couple of years now and good mates! I was making music during Covid with a guy called Gianluca Buccellati. He’s a producer who works with a bunch of artists like Arlo Parks and Biig Piig, etc., and I was put in touch with him through my label at the time, and we made a bunch of music together. He was making Declan’s last record with him, and he brought Declan out to stay with us in Hawaii one time, and we made tunes together and really hit it off and had a really good time! I ended up playing on a bunch of Declan's last records that we made together. So it’s very sweet to collaborate on all this stuff. Over the last couple of years, we became really close mates between Hawaii / LA when they were recording, and London, and he asked us to go on tour with him last summer, and it was a blast! I took my Grandma on that tour.
MD: Whaaaat?! I love that!
ES: That just kind of happened; it wasn’t the plan, but my bass player couldn’t make it last minute, and I was trying to scramble to find somebody (my Grandma plays bass), and we both jokingly said (we call her Tutu) Tutu would be down to do it, and we were like, actually she would totally be down to do it, and that would be so sick. So she came down, and we did the whole support tour together, and it was epic!
MD: Wow! You’re like The von Trapps from the Sound of Music but the Rock ’n' Roll version.
ES: [Laughs] Exactly! … she out-partied all of us too!
MD: This is F Word magazine, what’s your favourite "F" word?
ES: Food.
