Name: Amanda R
Place: Portland, OR
Your relationship to music: creator, music is the conduit to my emotions
Industry: Visual merchandising-make things beautiful and masterful multitasker
I first met Amanda, through her sister Vanessa, who was featured last week. Amanda has a great eye for photography and takes pictures around her current home in Oregon that would beckon anyone to visit. She is currently on a break from songwriting. We did this interview via Facetime. We talked about her five songs and what it is like to live in Portland.
5songpjct: You had written your own text for the songs which was really helpful. I love how brief, yet descriptive they are. That is really hard to do. I thought they were all great. You had actually touched on all of the questions I was going to ask you. Like, what it feels like to live so far away when your family has a very close relationship. I kinda did the same thing…my family is very close and I moved somewhere completely different. I feel at home more in Los Angeles that I ever did in Minneapolis. It took moving halfway across the country to feel that way.
Amanda R: That’s always been difficult for me. My parents divorced when we were really young. Then my sister went to college. We were kind of moving around after that. I guess I never had the feeling of “Oh I am home.” When I was getting used to my new school then we moved to this small town which was the complete opposite of everything I knew. So that was really hard for me. To finally be somewhere where I feel part of something (Portland.) I love my little neighborhood.
[We start talking about a trip I had taken to Tokyo which recently popped up in my instagram feed.]
5songpjct: One of the things I love about Japan is that they really protect their past. You can be standing in front of this modern sphere-like glass building and then turn down the street and see a something from the Edo period. I think that is one of the things I don’t like about L.A. is this eagerness to erase the past. I had no idea before moving here that things I had wanted to see no longer existed. All the Old Hollywood stuff. That and everyone in Tokyo was very friendly.
Amanda R: That is one of the things I love about Portland is how nice people are. When I was back in L.A. recently I noticed how different it was. In Portland you are in the city, but it is a small city, so everyone acts like they are in a small little community, You go into places and everyone says hi and asks you how you are. I feel like I am back in time and I freaking love that.
5songpjct: Could you describe in a few words your theme for the five songs you chose for this project?
Amanda R: Emotional storytelling. I could have picked a lot of songs on my playlist, but these are the ones that held really strong meaning for me. Some of the songs I don’t really listen to anymore, but they correspond with different moments in my life.
5songpjct: What was the hardest thing about this project?
Amanda R: I was talking about this earlier with someone, the hardest thing was sticking to the theme and not picking songs that I am listening to right now. I had wanted the songs to be a timeline of moments in my life. I also had a hard time picking just five. I had to skip over a lot of music that I really love. I think about music a lot, it kind of keeps me going. I also think that doing this (Five Song Project) was good for me, because I like finding time to be creative and need to make that more of a priority in my life.
Your assignment for today, Sunday, January 28, 2018:
Continuing on with our format, your homework for today is to listen to these five songs. Throughout the week we will let you know why they were chosen. They are songs 21-25 on the companion Spotify playlist or you can listen to them via YouTube by clicking the song title.
[1] Bats for Lashes. “Siren Song.” Two Suns, 2009
[2] Heartless Bastards. “Hold Your Head Up High.” The Mountain, 2008
[3] Velvet Underground. “I’ll Be Your Mirror.” The Velvet Underground & Nico, 1967
[4] Unknown Mortal Orchestra. “From the Sun.” II, 2013
[5] Aretha Franklin. “Respect.” I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You, 1967
NEXT UP.… the 21st song in the Five Song Project