We sat down with Adelaide singer / songwriter Naomi Keyte to discuss her sophomore album Milk Paper Gold, out now.She highlighted her collaborative process with songwriting mentor Ben Talbot-Dunn and co-producer Nick Huggins. She also emphasizes themes of connection, live performances, and overcoming challenges posed by climate change and COVID-19. Milk Paper Gold is an evocative nine-track exploration of self, connection, and the search for balance amidst life’s uncertainties.
Now that Milk Paper Gold has been released, do you feel that you have a better understanding in the way that you record?
I feel like I learn a lot each time. This time, I spent a couple of weeks doing pre-production with my songwriting mentor and co-producer, Ben Talbot-Dunn. He’s awesome, he’s a writer and a musician that I really admire. We’ve got a nice friendship, so there’s a lot of trust and good rapport there. I went across to work with him for a couple of weeks before I went to record the album, and that was really good, because that allowed me time to flesh out the ideas and demo the songs. I’d never done that before. I did end up working with the same producer, Nick Huggins, because I really like working with him, and it worked well last time.
You really look at different forms of connection, to yourself, to others, to narratives, to audiences; has that been a fairly consistent theme for you over your career?
Yeah, it probably has, but I think it’s been in the last few years that I’ve kind of actually realized that’s what it’s all about. I guess that gives me drive to play the live shows, you’re having this once off experience with this group of people coming together, it’s not repeatable. So, you have this special experience. And I feel like, particularly after COVID, when we lost the ability to come together physically, that I value that a lot more now, and I don’t take it for granted as much. I really value every single live show, and I think I think more broadly, connection is one of my core values, so that that’s really why I’m sort of more aware of it in my artistic life as well.
Starting with the first track on the album, “How to Make Plans”, I can see young people are looking ahead towards a difficult future. How do you manage having an uncertain future?
Yeah, that’s what the song’s about. Like we’re looking down the barrel of pretty black climate stuff. There are just so many unknowns and a lot of scary things that will happen in our lifetime. It’s kind of sometimes you just want to forget about it and just pretend everything’s fine, which is most of the time, but when you do something about it, it’s quite overwhelming. Like having kids; my parents said to me, if we were you, they advise me not to have children. What a thing to say to someone, it’s like, there’s no future, don’t bother. As an artist as well, during COVID, we couldn’t fly, we couldn’t tour, we couldn’t play live shows, there were just so many unknowns about what it was going to be like moving forward. Am I doing the right thing? Should I get another job? Why am I doing this? Who really cares?
Whereas the second song, “Gillian”, is much more of an uplifting song, with reference to Gillian Welch. She’s obviously an influence on you.
Gillian Welch is a really amazing singer, kind of an alt-country singer songwriter. She and David Rawlings are a duo, and people are like mad about them. They’re actually coming to Australia next year. That song is exactly that. It’s about feeling the opposite feeling to the previous song. You’re in the right place at the right time, you’re on the right track. It’s gonna be okay.
The third song is “Emmylou,” so it’s becoming clear to me who your influences are.
There’s reference to Phoebe Bridgers in the first song, and then Gillian Welch in the second song, and Emmylou Harris in the third song. It’s a kind of a nod to these artists, female artists in the music industry, that unapologetic excellence of those who have made lifelong careers. I don’t think there’s that many Australian female artists we can look to, like Paul Kelly and other rock men who have had long careers. So that was a little bit of a nod to them.
One thing that got me was the dynamic between being an introvert and an extrovert. I think that artistic people need to express themselves through art.
I think it’s usually like we all have areas in our life that we’re not confident about, maybe we’re not strong with certain skills or certain scenarios, and then there’s areas that we are really passionate about, that light us up, and in those areas we might shine. Artists are like that. So many artists and performers across the genres identify as being introverted, but when they’re doing the thing that they really care about, they totally just like light up.
“Warm Water” is a song for the loves that have gone before. Echoes of the past and things like that. To me that’s an important part of our life.
That one is interesting, it’s actually about an ex of mine, but now they’re a really good friend. Lots of people, when they hear the song, it reminds them of their mother. It’s that thing about being warm, like washing your face, those acts of intimacy that you might have with family.
The next song, “Homesick” I can identify as with as well, because I love traveling. When you do travel, you do get homesick. And feeling homesick when you’re home, is a sign perhaps that you’re not in the right place?
I’m actually planning a lot of travel. I’m feeling like I’m ready to do some exploring and have a break from being in Adelaide. Not because I don’t love Adelaide. It’s just that I haven’t travelled much since before COVID. I had a few overseas plans that got cancelled. So, I’m going to tour Australia first half of next year, and then I’m going to go to Europe, the UK and Scandinavia in the second half of the year.
I saw that the next song “Greenhill” got a positive write up from Triple J’s Zan Rowe.
That song is probably the song that people respond to most. It got a lot of radio play and put on a bunch of Apple playlists and stuff.
To me, it reminds us of simple times, you know, baking cakes and things like that. I think our lives these days can be as complicated we want, but we really want to get back to that simple time.
I think it’s balance, isn’t it like you want new things and excitement, but having a beautiful home and doing calm, creative things at home is really grounding and nurturing.
The next song is “Circles”. To me, music and dance going together is perfect. I understand that you were inspired by pieces from The Sydney Dance Company and the Australian Dance Theatre. It’s clear that you’re imagining this, this dance in your head, and it’s come out in music.
I think that the human body in movement is one of the most inspiring things. Those two pieces were really beautiful and moving. It was nice. I’ve never done that before, responding to other artworks in that way. That song just came out of me, like, I think, in the shower or potting around the house afterwards, and the chorus just came out, and it sort of just wrote itself, which is cool.
Oftentimes when I talk to songwriters, they have songs that just come out and other songs that they take a couple of years before they finally get it the way they want.
Some songs you have to craft. Some songs are kind of fully formed when they arrive. It’s usually the ones that are fully formed like that, they just flow out. When you play them live, they just flow. Like even recording was just easy, not laboured. You don’t overthink it. It just sorts of happens. It’s very intuitive.
That sort of harks back to the warm water, echoes and the resonance and things like that. The track “Morningtide” is about spending time in the country, the ideal that people are looking for but don’t get in their daily lives.
I’m super lucky to have this beach house, it’s in my family, and I’ve been going there since I was a kid, and I’ve written maybe three or four songs that refer to that place. That song is speaking to the fact that it’s really hard to step away from like ambition and drive or like societal pressure to like just work all the time. Capitalism and endless growth as a concept for your life, when actually that’s not sustainable. And we know that people are burning out left front and centre. It’s really important to just slow down and just have a break and disconnect from Tech.
The final song, “Breaktooth Park” is about being alone, but not lonely. So, finding yourself. I think that’s an important thing that people are struggling with at the moment in general. Getting back to everything we’ve been talking about so far.
Ultimately, the relationship that we have with ourselves is the most important relationship. And if that’s solid, moving through the world alone doesn’t have to be a negative thing. Sometimes my most peaceful insightful, connected moments are when I’m just doing my own thing at my own pace, like I’ve worked through lots of stuff, and I feel comfortable in my own skin and comfortable in my own company. As an artist, I need that. I think we feel the need to fill up every minute of our schedules with work or people or chores or whatever. Actually, just being, and being alone is really important.
I’ve learned that self-care, love and understanding, means that you’re number one. It’s like you can have these negative thoughts in your head. In the end, would you talk like that to another person? No, so why would you do that to yourself?
Yeah, that self talks. Sometimes you don’t even realize it’s happening because it’s so subconscious, so habitual. But when you start to hear it or and notice it, yeah, it’s really important.
What what’s next? Will you be going to take it on the road?
I’m having a launch in Adelaide in early Feb, which gives the audience some time to get familiarity with the songs. So have that launch on the ninth of Feb, that’ll be the first show of my Australia tour; Tassie, Victoria, New South Wales, Brizzy, maybe a couple of shows up the East Coast. I’ve been invited to like this festival in Germany, in August. So, through to October, I can spend time overseas doing shows. It’s one of the things on my bucket list to tour overseas. They’ll probably be really small shows. I don’t have an audience, really, so it’ll just be like an experiment. But I’m kind of more in it for the experience and learning and being able to travel with a purpose.
I’m so excited just to release this album. It’s been four years, four years of work, lots of money, loads of money, grant applications, so much admin, and just the mental load of it, I don’t imagine I’ll make an album anytime soon, but I might do, like an EP, or like an A side B side release, or something.
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Milk Paper Gold is out now. Listen to it and purchase it through Bandcamp. Learn more about Naomi Keyte on her website.
And don’t miss the Milk Paper Gold Album Launch:
Sunday 9th Feb, 7pm
Goodwood Theatre
Kaurna Country /Goodwood, SA
