In this instalment of our Featured Alumni series, we catch up with Songwriting and Artist Development graduate Mollie Scott.
Mollie Scott has been busy since leaving ACM, her proudest moment to date is the release of her new EP ‘Naked’. We caught up with Mollie to find out what she’s been up to since graduating and also the story behind ‘Naked’…
What have you been up to since graduating from ACM?
“Since graduating from ACM, I have been gigging all over the place and released my second original EP titled NAKED. I had the EP launch in November accompanied by my 7-piece band at The Wedgewood rooms in Portsmouth and sold nearly 400 tickets which I was overwhelmed with being an unsigned artist. The EP is available on all streaming sites such as Spotify, Itunes, Apple Music etc. The music video for the single on the EP, ‘Naked’ can be found on YouTube. I am currently planning gigs throughout the year, sharing this new material and really getting it out there. I have a few festivals lined up for the summer which I am not allowed to announce yet but I am sooooo excited so keep your eyes peeled for that!”
Tell us about the new EP and the inspiration behind it…
“NAKED is a conceptual EP taking you from start to finish through my experiences of lust, love, heartbreak and freedom. This collection of unadulterated RnB and soul, infused with hip hop and thought provoking lyrics, sees me take a journey from first love to moving on. With each song I drew from past experiences and emotions felt and put them in chronological order. The EP is called NAKED to represent the fruition of me becoming a woman/adult and feeling more mature and experiencing feelings such as betrayal where I may be made to feel venerable. It includes elements of love, sex, pain, anger and happiness.”
How do you go about writing your songs?
“I start with the music before anything else, whether that be chords I’ve messed around with on the piano or if a producer has sent me a backing track they want to collaborate on I will start with that. I never start with lyrics. I will sit there playing the chords round and round until a melody comes to my head, then I will keep repeating the melody until lyrics come to me. That’s where I establish whether the song is going to be a happy or sad song etc, depends on my mood on the day. I then start writing these lyrics down and voice note every section so I don’t forget, it’s the worst when you forget to record it and then you can’t remember what you’ve just sang… haha! By the way I always write the old fashioned way with pen and paper, never on my phone, it feels more creative writing it down. Don’t ask me why, but I have just always done it that way, haha. When I start writing, I haven’t yet established whether the bit I’m singing is going to be a verse or a chorus etc, I just write and somehow it eventually all fits together and falls into place.”
Was recording Naked a long process? How did you collaborate with other musicians?
“The making of ‘Naked’ start to finish probably took me just over a year. After writing the songs for the project, I then named it with a title I felt fit best. There were a few songs I’d written intending for them to be on the EP but ended up not cutting it for me so I’ve kept them back and will maybe release them separate at a later date.
Each song was actually all programmed at first, instruments played in through garage band and logic etc but after my band and I had starting creating live arrangements of the songs for future performances, we realised the live versions sounded a lot different to the studio versions, so we decided to record every single song on the EP live in the studio. It sounded so organic and recording it with my band in the studio was so fun and I truly enjoyed every second. From this we decided to make the live recordings the main versions of the songs on the EP, but still put the programmed versions on there as bonus tracks for my listeners to hear. I love all the songs and the process of making the EP was so fun and by spending that much time with my band, a bunch of extremely talented musicians, we have become closer than ever and I truly feel that’s what makes an artist shine. It is definitely a project I am so proud of and am thankful to ACM for setting me up in good stead to becoming the best solo artist I can be. My band members: Amba Goodwin Tremain, Olivia Haggarty, Faye Carpenter, Kris Walden, Harry Drake, Jason Gale.”
What advice would you give to our current ACM students?
“Stick at it. It gets hard sometimes managing University work as well as trying to push yourself as an artist at the same time, but I assure you, what you are learning at Uni will really help you when you finish. Embrace the facilities ACM has to offer and embrace the amount of sheer talent and knowledge that surrounds you with your tutors and fellow students. You have such a good advantage being around such like-minded and inspirational people, use it to your advantage and create music and art that you will look back on and be proud of. Stay inspired and work hard all the time, even when it gets tough, they’re all life lessons and will help to mould you as an artist and person.”
Follow Mollie on Facebook // Instagram // YouTube // Spotify // Apple Music
If you’d like to study at ACM and follow in the footsteps of our alumni like Mollie Scott, please call our Admissions Team on 01483 500 841 or visit www.acm.ac.uk/open-days to book a place on an ACM Open Day today.
