Get to Know: Mereba

Photo credit: Vincent Haycock

For Alabama singer-songwriter Mereba, her albums enjoy an organic sibling relationship concerning each other, there are similarities and certain characteristics that mark her music, and therefore a line can be drawn project to project; however, if you are fortunate to have siblings, you know that you are also physically and inherently different. Those differences can come from life experiences, and how they shape us, as well as what interests we take from the world.

“You can have two kids from the same parents, but they can be remarkably different”, she comments thoughtfully as she speaks to New Wave Magazine about her third album The Breeze Grew a Fire.

Unsurprisingly, one of those changes was the Covid-19 Global pandemic. For Mereba, the pandemic shifted her viewpoint on the world through an imposed solitude that initially jolted her when she was starting to see her career open up before her very eyes. Frustrating but also a timely intervention.

Explaining the reasoning behind The Breeze Grew a Fire, she said: “With what happened in LA, the title took on a different meaning, but I thought of the title a year ago.

“I was considering this project and how it makes me feel. I love poetry, I love a title that’s dramatic and paints a picture in people’s minds, whether that’s through the meaning of it or the phrase of the title. So, I knew towards the end of making this album that it was a companion album to my first album.

“It feels like a sibling album. A lot of the songs echo back to something I touched on in the original album, but the stories have changed and evolved.

“I kept sitting with the feeling of a breeze because the songs on this album felt very gentle, but because of the focus on drums and percussion this time round, all of the songs have a pulse to them.” Sonically, previously projects favoured more guitars and piano keys production-wise.

However, she felt like something was missing. “It wasn’t the whole story, she said, alluding to the idea of a breeze. “What is the breeze doing for me? And what do these songs represent on a deeper level?

“I started to feel like the relationships on this album are the gentler relationships, they are more loving, comforting and soft. The ones with your family, your best friends or even your child. It’s comforting but it also empowers you. Their love is constant and unconditional, which gives you a feeling of a fire and passion. A tiny little breeze can grow a tiny little spark into something bigger.”

Mereba came up in the underground scene of Atlanta as an indie musician, and that led to her “playing every kind of show, folk shows, reggae shows, rap shows, R&B shows.” It also led to her honing her skills “as a performer and also a rapper and R&B singer, branching out from the super folk-centric space.”

It was also where she formed a relationship with rap collective Spillage Village, with other members including JID, Earthgang, 6lack, and others.

“It’s been a beautiful few weeks”, Mereba reveals as she reflects on her time spent living post-album release, which dropped on 14 February. “I love releasing music even though I didn’t do it for a long time.

“[And] In this stretch I love reconnecting with my fans and supporters after giving them this whole body of work, which has been with me, my friends and family for a while now.”

However, a week before the album dropped, four wildfires, Auto, Euton, Hurst and Palisades, the biggest, devastated parts of LA and its surrounding areas as briefly mentioned above.

“It’s been a great shift in energy from the beginning of the year with what happened in LA with the fires, and how crazy it was over here. And it’s still such a process of rebuilding here, but releasing music has been comforting”, Mereba said.

Mereba lived about “15 minutes” from Pasadena, and despite being from the East Coast originally, has strong ties to the area.

“I have a lot of loved ones in that area, friends and family who were affected and lost their homes. It rocked me mentally, it rocked all of us mentally and, it definitely took some time to regroup and get back into the mindset of releasing an album because life on a day-to-day basis seemed so uncertain during that time.”

Revisiting the creation process of how The Breeze Grew a Fire was brought to life, lockdown played a huge part in it, where Mereba initially struggled with writer’s block.

At the start of making the album, she said: “One of the most important things to me was reestablishing my relationship with my pen and my songwriting.

“I say that because the combination of the pandemic and becoming a new mum, really shifted the relationship with myself and my artistry, because before that, my expression had always been top priority in my life. I was very much a servant of my ideas.

The Third album was entirely written by Mereba and produced by Mereba with the help of Sam Hoffman and Kibrom Birhane.

Photo credit: Vincent Haycock

Songs like ‘Out of the Blue’ and ‘Starlight (my baby)’ are dedicated particularly to her son.

The fan reception for ‘Out of the Blue’ was “unexpected” for LA-based artist, who didn’t originally think it would be a fan favourite. But it’s such an emotionally stirring song that highlights the way that relationships have changed in her life, which is a “huge” theme in the album.

There was also a recognition of that the impact of going from “a lot to nothing” like so many of us during the pandemic, killing her monument momentarily, she felt lost before it sparked her to look deeper.

As mentioned, released on the official day of love, so it is fitting that you come away from The Breeze Grew a Fire more familiar with the person you are, more at peace with the existence of you in the multitude, and more in love with yourself, your world and the people living in it. A timely and grateful intervention, sometimes before movement you first need to be forced to be still.

Mereba is now beginning the thoughtful process of curating her live shows for her North American tour, which starts at Sacramento, California on April 24th, and finishes back in LA at the Fonda Theatre.

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