Q&A: Emily Yacina Allows The Horizon Of Love To Take Form In New Album, ‘Veilfall’
INTERVIEW
INTERVIEW
☆ BY SYDNEY TATE ☆
Photo by Nikki Milan Houston
TO LOVE IS TO GRIEVE—something tried, true and guaranteed in this life. Emily Yacina endears all with open ears in her new album Veilfall, continuing a strong and respectable habit of self-releasing music while welcoming esteemed collaborators in an indisputable realm of astute sensibility.
Yacina floats gingerly amidst lofty melodies charged with universal truths, daring to grasp mortality by the throat in a necessary and ultimately wise embrace. Veilfall floats with a calm perseverance—perhaps gone from sight in day-to-day, yet echoing beneath the surface—acting as a tender blessing of stillness and crescendoing in vulnerability beyond an obvious tenor.
Luna had the pleasure of exploring woes and wonders with Emily Yacina. Keep reading to find out more about palm readings, what constitutes success as an artist and Yanina’s favorite spices to cook with.
LUNA: What is your favorite memory from September?
EMILY YACINA: Oh, my gosh, well, I love the back-to-school energy that September brings, even though it's been a very long time since I've been in school. I appreciate the way that you can enter back in and plug back in in September.
Time goes by a lot faster these days, now that I’m older, so sometimes I remind myself I still have a whole semester before the end of the year. There's so many things that I can get done in a semester.
LUNA: I've been thinking about seasons, but a semester is a nice way to think about it too.
YACINA: It’s three months, which doesn't feel long at all, but when I think about being in school, I used to write so many papers and learn so many things. There’s so much you can do in a season.
LUNA: This is true. I've read a little bit where you’re talking about spiritual practices, but I was wondering if you have any spiritual practices that you do daily?
YACINA: I don't know if there's something that I've done consistently daily. I go into different modes. Right now, I’ve been doing The Artist’s Way and that definitely feels like a spiritual practice, doing the morning pages every day. It’s difficult because it is three pages. If you don’t have anything that you’re currently going through, it can feel like a lot, but I find it to be so revealing of what’s going on deep in my body.
I’ve been doing it for two weeks and I’m very amazed by the things that I’ve been uncovering having that consistent practice. It feels very spiritual.
LUNA: I was listening to Veilfall on a beautiful, mountainous leaves-changing-type drive with the windows down, which I loved, but I was wondering if you have any albums that are perfect for an autumn drive for you?
YACINA: I immediately think of the Adrienne Lenker album, Abysskiss. It’s a perfect fall album.
LUNA: What are your favorite spices to cook with?
YACINA: I love seasoning different things with cumin. I love a smoked paprika situation, I love that smoky quality, it’s very helpful for cooking. Then garlic powder, because that comes out a lot in my kitchen.
LUNA: Cooking the garlic powder and the onions and everyone comes out—
BOTH IN UNISON: What’s that smell? (Laughs)
YACINA: Old faithful for sure.
LUNA: When dealing with grief, the people around us can stop checking in as much after a certain period of time, whether it’s intentional or not. I was curious how you feel about that or if you’ve experienced that—and if there are ways that we can try to be there for people in our lives that work against that?
YACINA: That's a great question, and that is something that a lot of people bring up at the Death Cafes that I host. A lot of people will rush to support in the beginning, and that’s all great, but the reality is [that grief] is such a permanent thing. There will be so many different iterations of the grief that last forever and I really struggle with that knowledge sometimes.
My first experience with grief was when I was so young. I think about how much has changed since then. It’s been 10 years, which is crazy, and life does go on. I feel like people have a hard time really realizing that, and it’s uncomfortable.
There’s this sort of idea that they’ll think of them every day and there won’t be a day that goes by that you won’t reflect on your relationship with them. In my experience, that’s not true, life goes on. Of course, I think of my loved ones who I’ve lost, but it is different.
It feels less like a burn and more of this subtle ache that I can tap into sometimes. It’s difficult because I wouldn’t know how to ask someone to support me in that—the time going by and how it feels different, or less intense than how it felt at the beginning.
I find that the best way to support someone in anything they’re going through is just to listen to them, no matter what is coming up for them.
LUNA: Thank you for sharing. I was writing about grief recently, and I wrote down, “What about this ache?” so I appreciate that you described it that way too. I don’t necessarily know what to do with it, let alone if things even need to be a conversation sometimes.
YACINA: It just is, it’s there, and there's not really anything that we can necessarily do to make it feel better.
LUNA: How do you differ most from your best friend?
YACINA: My best friend is a Pisces, and she really flows. If she’s feeling something, she’ll immediately tear up and the way that those emotions flow through her body is so fluid. I wish I had that quality about me.
I’m a Capricorn, so things get stuck and clogged sometimes, and so I’d say the biggest difference is maybe our processing times. My friend will be able to say, I’m feeling this way right now because of this, and her emotions will indicate that, and for me, I’m like, ask me in three years. I’ll know what’s going on by then, but right now I don’t know. I get analysis paralysis a lot. I’m more clogged than she is.
LUNA: I hear you. I've noticed contrast like that in a lot of close friend dynamics.
YACINA: I learn so much from her, and I feel vice versa, but the way I learn so much from her is because we’re so different. It’s just one of those ways that constantly comes up and I wish I could really be embodied like she is, to have my feelings and let them come out, but I also know it’s hard for her too. We teach each other.
LUNA: I was wondering if you've ever had a palm reading or a tea leaf reading?
YACINA: I have never had my palm read, but that sounds awesome. For a lot of that stuff, it’s about finding the right person. If someone comes to me with their recommendations, I’m super open to that, but I’ve never come across a palm reader. Have you?
LUNA: No, but I've had a tea leaf reading. That was a month or two ago, and I did enjoy it, but there were some things where I could see it and others where I didn’t feel like it pertained to me at all. Then my fear with a palm reading is that I go and they’re like, you have three years left, or they would say something else that would hurt my feelings or stress me out (laughs). I don’t know if I could handle that.
Album art by Ben Styer
YACINA: You don't know if you would want to know. If they did say that you had three years left, would you do anything differently?
LUNA: Hmm… (Laughs) That is a great question. I’ve not been living with that exact mindset, but this year I’ve been thinking a lot about how theoretically, if things are so extreme—thinking about climate change, for example—I will always lead with love and pleasure and my values forefront. If I was told I had three years left, I don’t know what I would change. Maybe I would take out a loan or something.
YACINA: Yes, go to Vegas (laughs), bet it all. I also sort of have that grounding mentality. I don’t know what’s gonna happen and all I can control is my approach to things. I try to live life like I don’t know when, because we don’t.
LUNA: Right, and I don't think it necessarily has to be in some devastating way, but why would I not want to give my all? Anyway, I was wondering about the sunset picture on the album cover.
YACINA: The artist Ben Styer took that picture. He is so prolific, he’ll be making things every day and I’m a big fan of his work. When we were talking and collaborating, he was in a mode where he was taking photos and bringing them out to play in his art practice, so [the cover] just happened.
I saw the photo and I felt like it evoked the same feeling that the album does, and I think that’s why he brought it out and suggested it. That was all Ben.
LUNA: It’s beautiful. What do you think of the phrase “the grass is always greener?”
YACINA: I have a tendency to want to change everything every few years and restart my life. I’m going through this right now actually, where I’m sort of playing with the idea of moving, but I always have to remind myself that wherever you go, there you are.
I have this urge sometimes to run from things, and I’ve had to remind myself a lot that you can’t run from everything. Especially now—I’m going to be 30 in January, and I’m realizing I can’t avoid attachments to people.
Not even thinking of that in a relationship context, but in general, just caring about people and friendships and having others rely on you and vice versa. Community and all that. I am always super interested or excited about the idea like, what if I just moved far away and then started over again? Now that I’m a little bit older, I’m realizing the attachments to these things and these people are very unavoidable. Not even that, they’re a part of life and what makes life meaningful.
To the grass is always greener, I would say, wherever you go, there you are. That’s something I need to tell myself all the time.
LUNA: Especially with moving, you never know the differences between visiting a place and your day to day life there, or what other situations you may find yourself in, all those experiences that color it. There’s always that risk, but you’re right that the roots only grow deeper.
YACINA: It’s so true, yeah. I’ve been really attracted to the idea of putting down roots for a little bit, but I need to commit to where that is.
LUNA: Some pondering is happening.
YACINA: Exactly, yes.
LUNA: How do you define success?
YACINA: With music specifically, if I ever feel like, what am I doing? I remember that I just need to like the songs. As long as I really like them, and if no one else does, that’s cool. That’s successful to me because I’ve made something that I think is genuinely good, and that’s very grounding.
If I’m ever nervous about how the music is received or if people will get it or resonate with it, no matter what happens, it is successful in the way that I was able to create something that I enjoy listening to. It is important to try to dim down how other people see it, to get intimate with yourself and see that hopefully you feel proud of what you’ve made.
LUNA: It is wonderful if people receive the music well, but you’re right that it is coming from within, and it is about you and for you. I agree that should be the core.
Are there any movies that you've watched more than five or six times in your life?
YACINA: I recently re-watched, probably for the fifth time, Practical Magic. I love watching that when it turns autumnal. I’m obsessed with that movie. I was watching it and texting my friends saying how it was a perfect movie.
