Singer-songwriter Haley Blais rocks DIY spirit at Squamish Constellation Festival
YouTube videos have propelled the Vancouver-based artist to musical success
Haley Blais.
Squamish Constellation Festival, running July 22 to 24, presents Haley Blais on July 23 at 4:30 pm at Hendrickson Field
HALEY BLAIS IS the poster child for Vancouver’s DIY music scene. Blais started making YouTube videos in 2014 and garnered an audience for her video diaries, which have now amassed some 170,000 subscribers. Her debut EP, Late Bloomer, is a charming self-produced compilation of tender vocals and soft-spoken lyricism over ukulele.
Blais is now a full-time musician with a plethora of EPs and singles under her belt, including her newly released song, “Coolest f*cking b*tch in town”. The track retains the humorous self-deprecation and vulnerability of her early music, this time with a full band and a matured perspective.
“I started [making YouTube videos] right after high school, so I was 17,” Blais tells Stir. “My content has stayed pretty much the same, just snippets of my life you can experience through vlogs or music. I watched a lot of sketch comedy as a teenager, and that really influenced the way I filmed my vlogs when I was first making videos. I view those videos the same way I would feel about a really old song, you cringe and then thank god you've grown. It's cool to see the growth.”
Blais started out posting covers to her YouTube channel. When she began releasing original music, she would plan and promote release shows on her YouTube channel, building a live audience from her online platform. In 2016, she released her debut EP, Late Bloomer.
“Late Bloomer was really special,” Blais says. “I recorded each song on the floor of my living room on Garageband, to no click or tempo beat. I did one take of every part, didn't tune anything, and had no idea what I was doing.”
A coworker at her coffee-shop job mixed and mastered the EP. Friends added the album’s finishing touches—a bit of electric guitar here, a bit of percussion there.
“I was producing without even realizing what that meant,” Blais says. “I had a photo shoot for the EP cover in my backyard, and my sister-in-law took the photos on a shitty digital camera. It was the first music I ever released to streaming, and people started listening. I think it cost me a total of $50.
“The technical producing side of things was really only sparked for me recently in making my sophomore LP, Let Yourself Go, but I've been writing my own songs since I was 14 or 15,” she says. “I wrote a lot of early stuff on my ukulele, a phase I'm glad I'm out of but also glad for since it's such a user-friendly instrument. I honestly think if I had started writing songs on an instrument that required, say, a more technical talent or focus, I couldn't have written the songs I did and still do today. It made me focus more on the lyrics and the story than anything else. But now it is my own burden that I'm nearly 28 and can't play barre chords.”
After the success of her first EP, Blais quit her café job to pursue music full-time. Aside from her solo career, Blais also plays bass for the Vancouver band Babe Corner, which recorded its debut album earlier this year.
Blais released her first full-length project, Below the Salt, in 2020, and is now anticipating the release of an as-yet-unnamed second album.
“Below the Salt was such a fun experience, but in hindsight it really does feel like a compilation album, or an EP or something,” she says. “This second album feels like my first. It's excruciatingly personal and honest in a way I was trying to be with Below the Salt, but I wasn't ready yet. ‘Coolest fucking bitch in town’ is a great first taste into what this album is about.”
To Blais, music has always been deeply personal, an artistic medium that evolves alongside her.
“It's confessional,” she says. “Music has always been the only way I can process any strong feelings. I don't keep a diary or journal, because it's easier for me to write a vague or clever one-line lyric that encapsulates whatever I'm going through.”
Blais perceives the greatest milestones of her musical success, however, as the relationships she has made because of YouTube.
“I met my best friend because of it, and a lot of other meaningful relationships,” Blais says. “But when anyone comes to a show of mine and tells me they've been a fan ever since I cut my bangs drunk in my bathroom and posted it online, I can thank YouTube for that too.
“I've had amazing opportunities to work and tour with artists I love and admire, and I'm really grateful that anyone listens to my music at all,” she adds. “The biggest challenge for me is what happens after the music has been recorded. What are the visuals? What's the font? What's the vibe? Should I get a haircut? What should we wear on stage? The music comes so easily, but those trivial decisions drain me.”
Blais’s new single, “Survivor’s Guilt”, comes out on July 19. “Keep an eye out for the album,” she quips, “once I decide on a font.”
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