I corresponded with the artist Anna Ran this past fall. I am beyond pleased to finally share our conversation with you. Anna channels intense transformative forces through her music. Her performances are captivating and genuine. It is an honor to help share her work with other people and I hope you take the chance to not only read her responses to my questions but also to watch and listen to the works I am posting here. I suggest you start by watching Ran and her band in the video below before diving into the interview proper. The songs come from her debut album, ‘Desert Flower’.
CR:
Maybe you could start by describing who you are and what your early experiences with music- how did you start down this creative path?
AR:
My mother grew up with no culture or art around her at all, and somehow, she knew that she had missed out on something important. She wanted to give that to her kids. So when I was about seven or eight years old she asked if I wanted to join a children’s theatre group, where they also sang and danced. Off course I wanted to try that, I loved dressing up as different things ALL the time. In the first play I was in, I played a popcorn. I was lying there on stage, curled up as a corn waiting to pop when the music started, listening to the audience behind the curtain. It was exciting. And so, I stayed in this theatre group for many years.
As for my own artistic creating, it started with words. My grandmother wrote poems, but they were just for her to read. Somehow however I knew she did that. And maybe that’s how I knew I could do it too. I was writing poems and things from when I was a kid. But I didn’t know you could write your own songs yet. I don’t know why I couldn’t figure that out for myself. But that realization came a lot later.
CR:
Did your relationship with theater continue? I notice you have a penchant for costumes. Are the costumes a consistent form of expression in your life, or are they related intrinsically to this latest project?
AR:
I left the theater group when I was about 15 years old and continued with music after that. Which was what most naturally existed within me. I also am someone who wants to create my own universe, which I can do with music. There I am the director, the composer, the costume designer and everything else that the music needs. I do love costumes and the world of the visual expression, and music gives me the space for this. When I was little, the most fun thing to do was to create something out of nothing. I didn’t get any costumes purchased from the store. I made my own from some old skirt, some paper, a ribbon, a coat hanger. Whatever I found at home. And when I was at Grandma's house, I could use all her scarves, which I tied together into different types of dresses and headdresses. That's still what I do now and what I think is the most fun. That’s when I get lost in my own world, disappearing into my bubble. And I also love wandering around at flea markets and in secondhand stores. For the video "All I wanted was you", I sewed the coat from a curtain I found at a secondhand store, cut up some nylon tights and wore under it. For the headdress I bought pink dried grass from a flower store and attached them to a piece of cardboard with hot glue and attached some old buttons I had at home in the middle of it. I borrowed a pregnant belly from a theater, which I cast with plaster. I look forward to get lost again for upcoming music. We’ll see what happens then.
CR:
What was the creative process for Desert Flower? What we're the catalysts which caused it to come into being? It seems clear there is heartbreak and growth involved. It seems intensely personal. How is this reflected in the process?
AR:
The making of ”Desert Flower” was a long process, which started with my subconscious. Sentences came to me. I had a strong feeling I had to confront what I was scared of doing. I had been working on some music with no conscious goal of it being a debut album. Then one day I was sitting in my bed and I had a thought - ”I am afraid of creating an album”. And as soon as I verbalized this thought in my mind, it was so clear to me - I was going to make an album. The titel came to me in the same moment. Then I started working. Writing and recording demos of the songs in my studio and then showing them to my coproducer Filip Leyman and to the musicians I work with.
This is an album, as you write, about heartbreak and growth. No matter what this growth or parting of life as you know it entails - growth hurts. And it’s easy to hide away from it. Out of fear of hurting others, fear of putting your needs above others, fear of taking up space, fear of feeling greedy, fear of change, fear of uncertainty. But no matter the reasons, your body will let you know.
What I hope for now - whether you are someone who have not yet started to listen to yourself, you are someone who has started listening to yourself or if you are someone who is not able to listen to yourself because of circumstances around you - is for people to feel seen by this album. And for people to see themselves.
CR:
I love that this beautiful work comes from a compulsion to face your fears. Can you tell me about the other musicians who worked with you on Desert Flower? Who are they and what were their roles and contributions to the creative process?
AR:
The musicians I play with live and who also shared their deep, powerful, fragile, and banging musical expressions on the album, are really hand-picked and I am so happy and grateful that they are with me. It’s Karl Vento on guitar, Fanny Rapp on drums and Jonathan Albrektson on keyboard, synth and synth bass. In addition to those who play with me live, Alma Möller also plays viola on All I wanted was you on the album. My co-producer Filip Leyman has also played on the album, he played the drums on Be Created Or Be Destroyed for example. And I played some sounds and instruments also. I want to play with all these people because of how they express themselves musically in combination with how empathetic, unpretentious, kind and funny they are. I think and hope that during the process there was a good balance between me knowing what the song wanted and creating freedom to try things out and sometimes saying that I wanted them to just do their thing during a certain part. I always record a pre-production on all the songs that I bring to Filip and the musicians that we then work from. Filip is someone I really trust and he is so good at guiding me and stepping in when I sometimes just felt completely lost with certain things. Those times he and the musicians could test things together when I just had to sit, feel, zoom out, listen and wait for myself to reconnect. I am so happy for our collaboration and the environment we created together. It was exactly what I needed to be able to finish the record. Now I am really longing to record with them again.
CR:
Can you tell me about other projects you contributed to before deciding to record solo? How did these experiences hone your craft? I am also interested in knowing what music has been the most influential to the development of your own sound and voice? What music brings you joy or helps you transform and more deeply feel your own life?
AR:
I think I heard someone say that - ”To evolve your craft and your art you have to evolve as a person”. This is very true. I believe your art comes from the deepest part of you and if you have too many protective walls, fears, shame, pretensions or whatever it may be that you struggle with - it will stand in the way of your art. In the way of your art being able to come out in its full form and reach someone else’s deepest part. So if you are working on yourself in combination with also doing and doing and doing - you are honing your craft.
Before I released ”Desert Flower” under my own name, I have been in a band then I was in a duo, then I was writing just calling myself something else other than my name. But I have been writing the music in almost everything I’ve done. Miles Davis said something like ”Sometimes you have to play a long time to be able to play like yourself”. Maybe some people can find their true voice early, but I feel like I really found my voice with ”Desert Flower”. I can listen to it now and, even though I might have done some small things differently, I can still feel like - this is me, this is my own voice. And that makes me feel so proud of the album.
Except my own music I also put a lot of time and effort on working with a Swedish artist, Sarah Klang, when she was starting out. I recorded and produced her first single Sleep. This was a long time ago now, but getting to know her made me learn new ways of being and it expanded my mind. I also really love her as a person, so I am grateful for that time and for what the experience gave me.
A friend, another Swedish artist Anna Von Hausswolff, asked me to come along when she was recording an album, to work as a studio manager. I didn’t have anything to do with the music or the recording at all. But I was there and experienced when she and the band recorded The Miraculous. I sat there in the big space at Acusticum listening to only her vocals when she was singing - it was magical. She inspires me in taking my art seriously and finding my own voice just by doing exactly that herself.
About two years ago me and Axel Larsson, the singer of Peace on Earth, started a band together called Neonhaze. I saw his concert when he played the same night as me at a club in Gothenburg. I was so struck by his voice and his expression, my intuition told me we had to do something together. A while after the concert I bumped into him again and I just said what I felt. I didn’t know him at all so I was glad he was so open minded. We met a few days later in my studio and now we have recorded amazing music that will come out soon. Our collaboration have also given a lot to my own music making.
I know that people need music for different parts of them at different times. I know I don’t want to dive deep into my core every time I listen to music. Sometimes I need another vibe. Just drifting off in my mind, having some music to just be there with me or make me wanna dance. Neonhaze is a completely other outlet for me than my own music with Anna Ran. And I love having these two projects. It makes me feel like I can give even more of myself and I know that one project evolves the other.
There is so much music to mention that has helped me. That I have listened to that has made me confront something in myself or made me understand a feeling. Or made me realize that I have a feeling about something that I’m trying to deny.
CR:
Would you be able to tell me about your upcoming projects that you are working on? What is the same and what is different about your process?
AR:
I am writing on my second album. I would say that the same in the process is how different I can feel towards a song I’m working on, depending on the day or moment. Different, is that I feel more free and confident about my voice, production choices and arrangements now. My feelings towards myself and what I do has evolved. So it is a bit calmer inside and I trust my inner voice more but at the same time it is just as demanding. I can have more fun now when I’m arranging a song. I give the song what is wants, and it can make me laugh at times. ”The song decides”, as Kate Bush says. But some days/moments I feel every cell in my body is saying I should just stop and realize that I can’t do this. And those days/moments it is almost impossible to feel that this feeling will pass - again. But you just have to ”keep doing the work”, as Patti Smith says. So that is what I am doing now. I am doing the work. And there is a lot of work left.
I am so very grateful that there are artists like Anna, I find her authenticity to be refreshing and inspiring. For me, her music hits that sweet spot that balances pop and avant-garde influences while being its own thing, delicate and fierce and unyielding.
You can find out more about her by checking out her website:
And by following her on Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/anna_ran_music
Anna, thank you so much for taking the time to answer my questions, it has been a wonderful experience.
As a personal aside, I have been overwhelmed this fall, mostly with work. As such, I am only now able to take the time to post some interviews that I wanted to get out earlier. This is the first of three I’m hoping to get out this December.
If all goes well, I’ll release my interview with Willow Tea next week.
Then I’ll close out this first year by releasing an interview with Erang.
I’ve also got releases of my own music coming out soon, in both digital and physical forms. In fact, I have a considerable amount of material that I have not had the time to put out there~ I plan to rectify this in the coming year.
Thank you for reading,
Continuous Revelations