Words by Sarah DiMuzio

As an avid fan of found-sound collecting and home recording setups, I was delighted to sit down with the up and coming ambient artist claire rousay to chat about sound, influence, and the creative process. Rousay’s work is often described as cinematic, or akin to film scores, but the artist prefers to think of it more as the sounds of someone watching a film in their living room. Rousay brings a touch of whimsy and humour to her music and her ideas on connecting with live audiences. If you have a look at her Twitter feed you’ll get a glimpse into the humorous thoughts that pass through her well-oiled machine of a brain. If you dig a little deeper you’ll find this whimsy is hidden throughout her discography, such as with her latest collaboration track Homard Rouge with Emily Harper Scott. The track’s title is French for “Red Lobster” and was named after a soul-stirring trip to the chain restaurant of the same name.

When did your love of sound begin?

When I was a kid–  my mom was a piano teacher and performer. She’s still actually a gigging musician, she gigs more than I do, and she rocks. She started teaching me piano around four or five years old. I didn’t love it at that time, but it definitely was the thing that sparked my love of music that would kind of come up a couple of years later. I think the first time I fell in love with playing music was when I started playing the drums. I was around 10 years old and I was like “oh this is an instrument I really connect with.” I think just how tactile it is, it’s just a fucking physical instrument. You can get so many sounds out of any instrument - but a drum kit specifically there are so many possibilities and I think that’s mostly what excited me about it. 

How many instruments do you play?

I mean I'm like bad at a lot of stuff. Good enough to do like 45 takes of an instrument and pick the right one. I can play piano and guitar well enough to record something, but in a live context, it’s real fuckin’ risky.

What is the creating process and creative cycle like for you? 

I try to make stuff every day; I think that’s the biggest thing. I’m really into routine, I really like rules and things like that. I’ll usually wake up and the first thing I do is make coffee and take my dog out, but then immediately I’m either listening to something, or I’m picking up an instrument, or sitting at the computer working on something that I worked on the night before. The way you start your day sort of influences the rest of it. If I can make something early in the morning I’m in that mindset all day and it kind of jumpstarts creativity.

You mention rules, do you have rules you apply to music?

When I’m making something new I like making lists. I’ll make a list and be like: I want it to be this long, I want the arrangement to sound like this, or I want to specifically feature this sound or this instrument, or I want whatever I’m doing to convey this emotion. I love sketching everything out on a piece of paper before I even start working on it. 

How do you choose your sound palette, and do you have a method for creating a ‘story arc’ within each track?

It kind of follows the same “rules” or parameters, but one of those parameters is the people I want to work with. It’s kind of cool taking people from other parts of your life or different ways of making music and then being part of that creative process. A lot of the people that played on the album really influenced how things progressed. My friend Alex Cunningham plays the violin, I sent him a track and he played on it, and it’s like “okay now I have to edit my end to match what he’s doing.” The same thing with my friend Mary Lou, I was in her apartment and we were just hanging out talking, and then she started playing and I was like “can you actually play something for the record?” And she was like “we don’t have any recording equipment!” And I was like “no it’s fine I have my phone!” So all the harp on the record was recorded on my phone. A lot of the things that other people bring to the table are really what influence the process.

Do you have any visuals, textures, or other sensory crossovers that you experience when working with sound?

Album artwork has always been kind of important to me because I think there’s a lot of haphazard album artwork selection out there. I have so many talented friends that I basically just have to go through my phone and be like “alright who makes something that feels the same thing as this?” It’s pretty easy to find people that way. 

I notice your name is always written all lowercase in a stylized manner, does this have a special meaning to you, or is it purely aesthetic?

Primarily aesthetic. I already use my own name for everything so it’s kind of cool using lowercase to separate it from what I use like for taxes. The separation is more for peace of mind.

You’re known as a collector of sounds and field recordings, what’s your go-to recording device for capturing sounds for your collection?

iPhone. I always have my phone on me so it’s the quickest thing. But also if I’m a little bit more prepared, the Zoom H5 with the mikroUši Pro from LOM. Their microphones are amazing.

Favorite piece of gear at the moment?

I try not to use anything that’s too expensive, but I recently bought the Una Corda plugin. I’ve never played a real one, but it’s a single string piano with all these different felt types, and I’m like “fuck you can switch up the felt in the plugin!” 

Where’s your ideal recording/creating space?

Pretty much just my house ‘cause I like the ability to start something, walk away and come back. And it turns out that going to a recording studio is expensive and you have time constraints.

Which artists and sounds influenced you at the beginning of your sonic journey?

For music like hyperpop, Fountains of Wayne or Teenage Fanclub, bands like Weezer. Stuff I listened to a long time ago. It comes back and I’m like “why do I like this sound so much?” because I heard this when I was listening to music for the first time independently.

Do you have any personal favourite releases or tracks/albums you are particularly proud of?

Really I’m just interested in whatever the newest thing is. Outside of that, I made a bunch of records playing the drumkit which is kind of cool. I listen back to it and it kind of sounds like a different person. It’s so crazy to listen back and be like I did that? I could physically do that? That stuff is pretty wild.

Do you have any personal favourite releases or tracks/albums you are particularly proud of?

Really I’m just interested in whatever the newest thing is. Outside of that, I made a bunch of records playing the drumkit which is kind of cool. I listen back to it and it kind of sounds like a different person. It’s so crazy to listen back and be like I did that? I could physically do that? That stuff is pretty wild.

Earlier this month you released a collaboration track with Emily Harper Scott for the American Dreams Records compilation In The Deep Drift You Will Find The Most Serene Of Lullabies. I saw that Emily dedicated the track to the chain restaurant Red Lobster - is there a story behind this track? How did this collaboration come about?

Em and I were trying to work on music for a really long time together and it didn’t really happen for various reasons. But in January we were hanging out and we got COVID together and we were like “shit, we have COVID. Well, we’re stuck inside we may as well record that thing we were gonna do together.” We finally made a piece and almost finished it, but then we had a second wave of getting really sick again. Finally, we tested negative a couple of times so we were definitely okay and we felt better, and we were like “what do we want to do to celebrate going back into the world?” And we were like “we gotta go to Red Lobster.” That’s what we wanted. We were inside for so long and we went a little crazy. We both love chain restaurants. We were like “we should definitely go to Red Lobster.” And we went to Red Lobster just like on a weekday, and just bought like three of everything. We spent so much money. But then we came back and we were like “okay if it was important enough for us to go there and buy so much food we should definitely call this track Red Lobster.”

What’s your favourite part of being an artist?

Taking something inside yourself and being like “this is something I thought or was exploring or feeling or thinking about” and somebody else can have an experience with it and then kind of relate back to you.

Are you currently working towards any hopes/goals/dreams?

I’m always trying to learn how to do something new. The first thing for me was performing by myself, and then performing using electronics, not just acoustic instruments, and then learning how to use Ableton, and then learning how to use Ableton Live. Right now I’m interested in having a live performance that is more than just sitting on stage and people listening, having it be something more than that. Making sure everybody who’s at the show is as comfortable as they can be. A lot of the time now I’ll go into the audience and ask them questions or sample them using the iPhone, and then I’ll AirDrop it to the computer into Ableton from the crowd area. That’s kind of a new way for me to interact with people instead of just sitting on the stage and having them just listen and clap.