Hello Mary on ‘Emita Ox’, their UK tour, and musical growth

Hello Mary are one of the most exciting up and coming bands in America right now. Initially, the NYC trio, featuring Helena Straight on vocals and guitar, Stella Wave on drums and vocals, and Mikaela Oppenheimer on bass, turned heads in 2020 with their ‘Ginger’ EP, a raucously fun, fuzzy, yet highly catchy batch of tracks. As time went on, their influences developed further, seen on their self-titled album last year. Now, the band are prepping for the release of their sophomore LP ‘Emita Ox’, as well as some highly anticipated UK tour dates. So we sat down with them to ask them about their upcoming engagements, and hopefully glean some insights into their creative dynamic.

Bit of a deep question to start – how do you define success as a band and as individuals? Are you on the same page, or do you have different definitions?  

Stella] That’s a loaded question I think. From a band perspective, I think it probably varies vastly based on a lot of different things, including like even the type of music that you make. I think for us, success would be putting out music that we feel proud of, and that turned out the way that we intended it to, or better, and that enough people respond positively to it that. We can walk away with a little bit of money too, that is probably also how I would how I would define success as a band, but that’s like a whole other capitalist side of it. But maybe it is as simple as making a record you’re proud of. As an individual, it’s also complicated, but probably spending your time in a way that makes you happy, and hopefully being able to support yourself through doing that. What more could you ask for? 

Mikaela] I feel like that pretty much sums it up. As a band, I oftentimes feel like we are succeeding every day because we are just doing what we want.  

Helena] I think my idea of success changes every day, so it’s kind of hard, but I kind of agree with Michaela. Little successes every day. I feel like our record is already a success to me just because we’re so proud of it. 

So, you’ve already got the success then? 

H] Right now, yes. Tomorrow I’ll feel differently. 

With your new album ‘Emita Ox’ coming out after ‘Ginger’ a few years back, I guess you’ve changed quite a lot as individuals. How do you feel like you’ve changed since the ‘Ginger’ EP? Do you feel like you’ve been able to push yourselves as musicians creatively in positive ways? 

S] Yeah. I mean, I think there’s been so much development and change. Most of it seems to do with age. When self-titled came out, when ‘Ginger’ came out, we were all so young, especially Helena. I’m a few years older, but the two of them were 17 when ‘Ginger’ came out and probably like 15 or 16 when recording it, and that’s a very different time in somebody’s life than when you’re in your early 20s. So, I think that alone has to do with the progression of the band, and then obviously influences changing and getting inspiration from new places. When you hear the difference in the music, that’s mostly what’s behind it. 

You’ve always had that alternative and indie rock vibe, but there’s prog elements in your music as well. I’ve always liked the heaviness, and the energy you guys put into the live performance. Have you always been on the same page, sonically? Did you come in with all those influences? Have you always had that cohesion? I think I read in an interview that you guys like to interlink with each other and really break down the songs. So is that something that you pride yourself on? Being able to, no matter how different some of your influences might be as individuals, connect it in such a cohesive and tight way? How easy or difficult is it for you to interlink based on that changing sonic influence? 

S] I think for the most part, we’re all pretty much on the same page. Maybe there was a time where things were shifting a bit, and maybe we were all in different places, but I think we’re all together on that stuff. I think we’re also good at letting each person give their input and make little changes to a song, or bring in a song that’s of a different kind. I think on this album, it was important for us to explore different territory, because previously a lot of the songs, they were different from each other, but they very much fell into like one category, which is like you were saying the indie, alt-rock, grungy kind of thing. We just naturally grew apart from that a little bit and wanted to use the studio to our advantage and do what we could. 

H] Going into this record, our musical tastes were different from each other, more than they’d ever been. When Mikalea and I were like 15 and Stella was 18, I feel like we all liked the same 90s music, but as we age, I feel like we’re following our own path and discovering music on our own, and disagreeing a lot, I think, but mostly agreeing. 

M] Part of that is also just knowing more music, because when we were recording ‘Ginger’, we listened to a lot of music, but it was probably the same 10 bands. I feel like there’s just a lot more to explore out there, and it’s cool to bring them together. 

S] I was just gonna revise what I was saying based on what Helena said about us having different influences. I think the reason I said that we have the same is because I feel like in the recent couple months like after recording the record, what we’ve been listening to in the van has come together a lot more. Helena is right though that leading up to and during recording, it was a bit more all over the place, but it seems like now we’ve kind of embraced a lot of new music. 

Like I said about sonic diversity, I remember hearing new single ‘0%’ and just being, blown away by it. What do you want the legacy of this record to be? What do you want people to think of this record 20 years down the line? 

M] That’s a really exciting question. I think I want people to, when they think of this record 20 years from now to be like, “Oh my God, I couldn’t stop listening to that when x” when they wanted to describe an era of their life. That would be really cool. That would be crazy awesome 

S] Whenever you think of albums that have stuck with you, that’s kind of how you envision them. You’re like, “Oh my God, I was obsessed with that when I was like, 15 and smoking weed in the park” or something. It represents a nostalgic thing. So, yeah, I think that would be a win, for sure if people were feeling like it connected to them enough to have it connect with like a time in their life.  

H] It’d be good if people listened back and were like “it still holds up” and maybe not like, “I was so obsessed with that when I was a teenager”, because I feel like there’s a lot of bands I feel that way about, and I just can’t listen to them anymore, and I think they’re bad.  

S] I agree that it should hold up, but also I really hope that anyone who can connect to it will connect to it. I think there is a lot instrumentally going on. Maybe not throughout the whole thing, but just like in certain parts, there’s a lot of intention and love behind it. I hope people will appreciate that. 

I remember getting the press release through and really loving the artwork for the new record. Can you tell me a bit about that and the inspiration there? Was that outsourced to somebody? What made you come up with that artwork? 

M] The artwork is by this woman, [Clementine Williams]. She was awesome, and she did our album art for the last record too. This piece she already made, we just saw it on her Instagram, and we were like, “this would be such an iconic cover.” 

You have some UK shows coming up in September, and then obviously, you’ve got a bunch of tour dates coming up back in the states as well. Is there anything tour wise you’re looking forward to doing when you come over here? Are you looking forward to the US tour dates, and how excited are you about coming over doing these shows?  

H] We’re really excited. I’ve never looked forward to a tour more. I’m excited for our London headline shows, because they’re selling out, which is crazy. I hope that we do really well in the UK. I think that’d be sick. Shocking, I think the UK is way cooler than America. 

S] I’m really excited too, because when we’re over there, our album will come. So that night will be fun, and I think the headline US tour following it will just be really fun because to have this album out, and to be able to play the songs for people, and see people’s response to the live versions of the songs will be so fun. 

Do you have any message for your supporters who have got behind you since the beginning of your time as a band? Because it’s quite a history you’ve got already. 

S] Thank you so much for caring and for showing your support. It’s crazy that there are people that we don’t know personally that care about this music 

Is there anything that I’ve missed that you like to promote? 

S] We are playing a bunch of shows in London. There are two headline shows, and then there’s two other ones that just got added, and the one with American Football. A couple of them are sold out, but come see us. 

To finish, again, you guys were all different ages when you started this band, and recording can be such a great thing, but also very intimidating. If you could send a message back in time to when you guys first started writing together, what would you all say to your individual selves knowing what you know now, having this record ready to come out and being so proud of it?  

S] Maybe this is a little self-indulgent, but I would actually say, “y’all are doing everything right, and you’re following your creative vision for the moment, and that’s great, and it’s going to keep evolving, and keep giving it energy, because it’s fulfilling.” 

H] I wouldn’t have wanted to do anything differently, so I don’t really have advice for my younger self, because I feel like everything that happened was good and got us to this point, which feels good. 

M] I would tell my younger self, “Good work. Be proud of yourself, and don’t think everything you do is stupid and dumb.” I feel like I could also tell my current self that. 

Hello Mary’s new album ‘Emita Ox’ releases September 13th via Frenchkiss Records. You can pre-order it here, and see the tracklist below. Tickets are still available here for the upcoming UK tour, starting at the End of the Road festival in Sailsbury this weekend. A full list of tour dates is also provided below.

‘Emita Ox’ tracklist:

1. Float
2. 0%
3. Three
4. Down My Life
5. Knowing You
6. Heavy Sleeper
7. Footstep Misstep
8. Courtesy
9. Hiyeahi
10. Bubble
11. Everything We Do

UK Tour Dates: