About That Song: Megan Burtt
About That Song #70
In our special series, singer-songwriter Sarah Morris interviews artists about the songs that shaped them.
Hi! I’m Sarah Morris. I’m wildly in love with songs and the people who write them. There have been a few songs in my life that have been total gamechangers—songs that made me want to be a songwriter and songs I’ve written that made me feel like I am a songwriter. About That Song is a space where I can learn more about those pivotal songs in other writers’ lives.
For our 70th edition, I was happy to connect with Megan Burtt! We talked about songs and experiences that set her on her artistic journey and the making of her amazing new album.
Megan Burtt. Photo courtesy of the artist.
Sarah: Hi Megan Burtt! It’s so nice to meet you! Based in Colorado, you’re a 2011 Kerrville New Folk Winner, 2015 Songwriter Serenade winner and more! I’ve spent time in both Colorado and Kerrville Texas in recent years, so I have heard of your excellence. Congratulations on your gorgeous new album, Witness—your first solo release since 2015 and first self-produced project. I know it was years in the making, and I can say as a listener that it was absolutely worth the wait.
This feels like a wonderful opportunity to discuss your songwriting journey. Do you remember the song you heard that made you want to be a songwriter? Tell us about that song.
Megan: I do! There were loads of artists and bands that I liked, but I remember being in a Blockbuster, renting weekend movies, and seeing Sarah McLachlan’s “Building a Mystery” music video on the TV screens. That moment is burned in my brain—I can still see the starlight on the dress and her rad haircut.
Sarah: I suspect Sarah McLachlan’s music turned many people on to songwriting. And I love that this memory has such a strong visual component! As soon as you said “Blockbuster” I was back in the very well-lit video rental store of my youth.
Once you began writing, did you feel like a writer immediately? It took me a few years of writing before I believed it—was there a song that gave you that “a-HA! I AM a songwriter!” moment? Tell us about that song.
Megan: I used songwriting to teach myself how to play guitar. I’m self-taught and learned by sounding out shapes that I liked to hear. So, songwriting was sort of a catalyst for playing guitar and visa versa. They both came like a high-speed train when I was 16. Songwriting has always felt like the way I process everything; it comes pretty naturally and I feel the least like myself when I’m not writing much.
Megan Burtt. Photo courtesy of the artist.
Sarah: I feel most like myself when writing too; it’s my favorite and best processing tool. Your album begins with the song “Drugstore Brand.” It’s an evocative title and contains lyric after lyric that made my songwriter heart all kinds of giddy, like “I’ve never been properly seen, properly diagnosed, but I wonder sometimes if a PhD might say I’m lonelier than most”—holy heck yes! Can you tell us about that song?
Megan: I wrote “Drugstore Brand” on the same July night that I wrote “Other Woman.” “Other Woman” came first, and I think I was so “drunk” on “song high” that I kept going. I’ve never done that before or since—written two songs in a night. “It’s hot as hell in New York tonight…” and it was. I was living in New York, and that city just seemed to pull crazy things out of me—like two songs in a night. Life there felt curfew-less and I wanted to be awake for the show.
At the same time, New York was my reset button, which made no sense in a city that doesn’t sleep. But I had a room that was mine and a city that didn’t know me, and I could just fall into this tiny cubbyhole of the world I’d carved out just for me—leave when I wanted, be who I wanted and come home when I wanted to. I loved living there. And it just about killed me.
I don’t like to overly complain in songs. I’ve got this internal “pathetic” meter that flares any time something gets too whiny. Drugstore brand is my attempt at acknowledging privilege while speaking to this internal and societal dialog that says, your worth is 100% tied up in your ability to accomplish things. And those “things” were created by someone else. It’s about wondering if you’re anything special at all, and if you “have to” be special to have value… If it’s OK to just live “small” or have a “normal” life. And if, when you “go for it” and then end up feeling like you’re just treading water—if that's actually a life worth living. “How can you be sure if what you’re signing up for is really any better than settling for just the drugstore brand”?
Sarah: Ah, yes, I know this dialogue. And the idea of needing to be special to have value. That can be an especially loud message when you live in the music/artistic world/business.
Speaking of the new album, you’ve said: “I discovered a side of myself that I liked. I stopped dancing around what I really wanted to say and embraced a new level of honesty in my music.” Was there a song you wrote for the album that gave you the sense this was possible in music? Where you felt that extra level of free?
Megan: So many of them. Certainly “Drugstore Brand,” “Family,” “Little Girls,” “Other Woman”—these are all songs that scare me and that I feel a little tingly playing live every time, so I know they check the vulnerable and honest box. I call them my “doozy” songs.
Sarah: The barometer of feeling “a little tingly” while playing them live sounds like a steadfast one. In the song “Unfinished Business” you declare “when two hearts are going head to head, no one is innocent / as love is my witness, you and I have unfinished business.” It’s phrased in a way that is utterly distinctive and wholly catchy; I was immediately drawn in as a listener. Can you tell us about that song?
Megan: I have so much fun playing this song. It’s a Megan Burtt uptempo song—which translates to a song that is “upper-level mid-tempo,” ha! Air quotes and poking fun encouraged. When I play it I imagine I’m in Fleetwood Mac and we are doing a groovy burning jam. This song could equally be at home in “driving songs,” ‘walk it out” OR “late night driving” playlists.
I’m PICKY about feel. We re-recorded this song THREE times. Once because the first groove didn’t feel right and second because the re-do needed to be a click faster. That’s right, I re-recorded a song for ONE BPM. Please send chocolate and alcohol to my engineer on my behalf.
I wrote this song at an annual Women’s Songwriting retreat I host outside of Austin every January. That particular January I was freshly uncoupled and ready write some damn songs about it. In true Megan songwriting fashion, the music came first with that guitar part, followed by some rage lyrics, a few daggers, and a little bit of self-pity and voila, you have yourself a good old-fashioned breakup song.
I wanted closure; it felt like the least I was entitled to, and I never got it, and I was pissed about it. I love what time and evolution will do to perspective. It might be the greatest gift that we humans are given. I got, or maybe should say, found, my closure eventually, but not in the way I needed it when I wrote this song. I don’t know what else there is to say. … This one is like a journey entry with a beat and some rhyme scheme.
Sarah: Here’s to the excellent journal entries with a beat, then! And also—to being picky! I applaud that—do it for the one bpm! Thank you so much for sitting down to talk About That Song. All the best to you on your travels, Megan!
See if Megan’s coming your way by checking her tour calendar!
Listen to “Unfinished Business”
Witness Album Credits
All songs written by Megan Burtt*
*“I See You” and “Family” written by Megan Burtt and Zach Berkman
“Dare You” written by Megan Burtt and Shelly Riff
“Electricity” written by Megan Burtt and John McVey
Recorded by John McVey at Cinder Sound Studios
Mixed by John McVey and Megan Burtt
Mastered by Anna Frick
Photography by Natalie Gray
Album design by Jeremy Fetzer
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Sarah Morris. Photo credit: Tom Smouse.
Sarah Morris is a superfan of songs and the people who write them, and a believer that certain songs can change your life. A singer-songwriter / mama / bread maker / coffee drinker who recently released her fifth album of original material, she’s been known to joyfully sing with people in her Big Green Bathroom.
