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Miwa Gemini
East-meets-West fairy tales abound in the New York folk singer’s second release, This is How I Found You
By Amy Oprean
Published: March 20th, 2008 | 1:05pm
Look up Miwa Gemini on the Web and you’re likely to find yourself smack-dab in the middle of a fairy tale. The Japan-born, New York–based folk singer’s biography reads: “Miwa was born sometime, somewhere, (long, long, time ago in a far away land),” then recounts a brief romance with Frankenstein and a witch’s curse that turned her best friend into a porcelain cat.
So maybe "facts" aren't Gemini's forte. With an imagination like hers, they don't really have to be. But her fanciful stories aren't all she has to offer. In particular, there's her new album, This Is How I Found You. It's a wispy collection of delicately woven songs that — while youthfully sweet and fairytale on the surface — embodies haunting themes full of the real-world heartache familiarly attributed to American country-western albums.
All this, and Gemini never lived in the United States until college, when she moved from Japan to study photography at NYU. While on the late-winter 2008 tour supporting her March 18 release, Gemini explained via phone how a childhood full of Hans Christian Andersen, American movies, and pop music was preparation enough for life in the West.
You went to NYU for photography, so when did you realize you wanted to do music, instead?
It’s really funny, but it was when I had my first big break as a photographer. I was shooting for a British magazine called Tank. I was doing fashion and working with very high-end models and stylists. That day, after the shoot, I kind of looked at it and said: “I really don’t … care. This is too hard. And if I’m going to suffer, I might as well suffer for something I really love, which has always been music.”
You grew up in Japan, yet there’s a very country-western feel to your music. Who inspired that?
I do love Dolly Parton, Loretta Lynn, Patsy Cline, Carter Family... I like the storytelling part of those songs; it fascinates me. You know what it is — I think — is that it’s so far away from where I grew up that it really gets my imagination going.
It’s interesting that so much of your music reflects those artists, especially since you came here when you were already an adult.
It’s partly that my parents were a big influence on me. We had more Beatles records in our house than Japanese music. All the books that I read were Western classics like Little Women, and [Vivien] Alcock’s children’s books. And both of my parents are big classic movie fans, so I watched Lilies in the Field when I was probably 10. I can’t even imagine the imagery right now, but it’s set in a big field with a tiny church in the middle of the desert — that’s as far as can be from Japan.
How would you describe your new album, This Is How I Found You?
It’s not as happy as it looks, but it’s certainly not as sad as it pretends to be. My first album [2005’s Forgetful Oceans and Other Strange Stories], my friends pointed out — maybe a year or so ago — that it’s definitely a break-up album. I had no idea that it was. I think this one is definitely more grown-up.
What is it that you like about fairy tales? Why do you write them?
I guess because [they’re] intangible. I write reality into fantasy and fantasy into reality. And fairy tales are stories that play on both those things. And you question, “Was that real, or was that in my head?” I feel like the ordinary world as it is, is so drab. You have to make it interesting yourself.
What’s your favorite fairy tale?
It’s called What the Moon Saw. It’s a collection of 22 stories that are written from the point of view of the moon. He goes around the globe. Some stories are sad; some stories are funny. It touches you; you feel it instantly. Even though they’re stories that were written years ago in a place you’ve never been, the emotions feel familiar. It’s beautiful — every single story.
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Miwa Gemini on MySpace
Issue #35
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