Eva Avila

Gemma interviewed the Canadian Idol alum on the eve of her sophmore release

CONFRONT: Your second album, “Give Me The Music”, is coming out soon.

EVA: Yep!

CONFRONT: Is it all done?

EVA: It’s all done, yes. It’s mixed and ready to go and ready to go to stores we just got to set it up and make sure we build up a certain momentum. I’m very excited! Very happy and proud!

CONFRONT: Is it much different from your last album?

EVA: Yeah it’s very different because it’s more organic and more soulful and more authentic, I find; so I’m very proud of it.

CONFRONT: Is there a specific message you’re trying to bring out with the album?

EVA: Basically my goal is to show the public a different side of my personality that wasn’t there before in the first album. It’s a little bit more mature overall, a little more soulful like a blend of Motown and a blend of an urban poppy sound. So I’m just trying to show the public different colors of my personality. The fact that I’ve grown up a lot, you know the past two years have taught me a lot, I’m 21 now and growing as a young woman. I increasingly know what I want out of life and out of my career so hopefully that will be reflected in this album.

CONFRONT: What in particular is very special to you about the album?

EVA: The fact that it’s so… I like the organic-ness of it, I like that it was actually live musicians playing on the record and then we added a few electronic things. But yeah, I like that it was much more authentic and that I was involved in the process where as in the first album I didn’t have time to give any comments, it was just very rushed cause after Idol we just had a month to put out the record. It was super crazy so this time around I was more involved and was participating in every step of the process.

CONFRONT: I heard you were you planning on going on to the U.S. with your touring? Is that true?

EVA: Well actually before touring there I would have to actually release in the States. We’re starting with the Canadian release for now then hopefully if the album does well we can start looking into shopping it in the States and perhaps in Europe. So depending on how it’s received, if there’s a success story there they might be interested and there’s a huge market in the States, it’s hard to compete with all the big names you know? So yeah, I don’t know like in the new year definitely, like I don’t know much about that, it’s a huge strategy of how to break out internationally so I just trust my manager and I trust my label with that, they know what they’re doing so we’ll see how it goes but it’s definitely in our plans.

CONFRONT: And you’re really lucky to have Sony on your side, they’re a huge record label company..

EVA: Oh yeah! I’m very privileged to be signed to a major label like that so I’m enjoying it for as long as it lasts.

CONFRONT: How does being on tour affect you and your family?

EVA: It’s hard. The first tour was 2 months and I did about 40 shows. It was hard on a personal level because it’s so exhausting but it was a lot of fun and even now, living in Toronto away from my family and friends from back home.. so it’s not the easiest thing but at least I don’t live in Vancouver, you know I can still travel once a month or once every two months to see my family. Like this weekend, tomorrow, I’m going for thanksgiving; I’m spending the weekend at home which is really nice. So it’s not only when I’m on tour, it’s actually like all year long when I’m working on different projects, when I’m doing promo like today, or in the studio recording. I just have such a hectic lifestyle now that I’m away all the time but every chance I get I visit and sometimes my parents even come up to visit me in Toronto when I’m available so you know, at least I can take some time off. Like this summer I spent 3 weeks at my family cottage so that was super nice and much needed. I’m very close to my family, I talk to my parents every day.

CONFRONT: Wow that sounds great. So how would you describe one of your shows, both musically and visually?

EVA: I think that the first tour was very intimate like we don’t have the budget obviously to do some big production and I can’t hire a choir and I can’t hire 20 dancers but the second album is much more organic and it’s gonna be alot of fun to play live because there’s a couple of changes in my band so we’re going to have an extra backup singer. We haven’t really talked about a concept for the show yet ’cause we’re gonna be touring in February, March so we still have a lot of time. But for like the showcase for example it’s gonna be very intimate, kind of low key, I don’t want to be like this huge show where it’s like a huge party. I just want to introduce 3 or 4 songs to the public and I don’t know I wanna incorporate a little bit of acting, like use maybe a couple props.

CONFRONT: That would be really cool!

EVA: Yeah I haven’t thought about it that much but I wanna bring something fun and different. We’ll see how it unfolds but I definitely want to brainstorm.

CONFRONT: On the new album, who writes the lyrics?

EVA: This new album is a mixture of a couple of my own co-writes and some songs that were offered to me by other writers, some from the UK, some from the States. For example the single “Give Me The Music” was written by this publishing company called The Matrix and one of the writers on the publishing company actually wrote Don’t Stop The Music by Rihanna so they have a pretty big profile. But yeah, working towards this record I did a lot of song writing myself and developed my song writing skills and it’sa lot of fun to have a bunch of creative ideas and putting them on paper then recording them. It’s really cool but mostly the lyrics are written by different writers from all over the world and a couple are my own.

CONFRONT: And how did you decide to put “Give Me The Music” out as your first single?

EVA: Um well we had so many good songs, all 12 songs on the record I’m very proud of but we wanted to… like two years after the first record I wanted to come back big and I wanted to have a certain impact on people and grab people’s attention so with “Give Me The Music” it’s just a strong statement, you know like give me the music it means so many things and the song itself I find has a really good groove to it, it makes you wanna dance so everybody just kinda agreed with me. I said “this should be the first single” so they agreed with me and it was pretty simple.

CONFRONT: So would you say now that you’re living the dream you always hoped for?

EVA: I definitely am because what I always wanted was to just put out a record and sing for a living and that’s what I’m doing now. My ultimate dream would be to have an international career, like my goal isn’t to like a millionaire or be famous but that’s something that comes with it. I just want to be able to reach different parts of the world, I wanna make a French record one day, I wanna make a Spanish record one day because my dad is from Peru so I want to embrace all three backgrounds that I have. I just wanna do this for as long as I can, I just want to do music as a living. It’s my passion and it’s what makes me really happy doing so if I ever feel like I’m not enjoying it anymore then that’s going to be a big red light sign, time to stop, but for now I’m just enjoying it and living it.

CONFRONT: When you’re having a hard time and feel like giving up, if ever, what do you to that inspires you and motivates you?

EVA: Well first and foremost I’m a human being so little things like calling a friend, going out dancing at a club with my girl friends or taking a walk outside.. like I’m a very sociable person and I love being around people, I’m a big people person, I’m not shy I’m the opposite of shy but I do enjoy being alone sometimes, actually a lot of the time like I’ll be at home with my music in my ears and I’ll be cooking or reading a book or watching a movie. I don’t mind spending a whole day by myself, just going out grocery shopping or walking around town in Toronto alone, I don’t mind that at all so when I’m down I usually just like to spend time alone and if I really need to talk, I’ll call my mom. It sounds kind of cheesy but it’s true. My mom is my best friend, I mean I do have some friends back home but everybody works, everybody goes to school so it’s hard to keep in touch like every single day and you know, also music is a wonderful solution sometimes if I’m feeling like I have a lot of stress to release I’ll go to the gym, or I’ll just sit down and listen to some Pink Floyd or sometimes some big heavy club music, like sometimes if I’m angry I’ll listen to like Disturbia by Rihanna and it makes me feel better and sometimes if I miss my family and feel really blue I’ll listen to Pink Floyd and sometimes it’ll make me cry but after that I’ll feel better.

CONFRONT: So yeah music really influences you in every area of your life.

EVA: Oh yeah! And even people who are not necessarily artists, even people who just enjoy music; like there’s nobody on this earth that doesn’t like music. It’s like the best therapeutic art in the world. It’s like, I can’t even imagine a world without music it just wouldn’t make any sense.

CONFRONT: Ha ha it’s true… What image do you feel your music conveys?

EVA: Um… well since it’s definitely evolved from the first one, I think it’s a strong statement record about growing as a young woman and increasingly knowing what you want and not just as a woman but as a person. Overall this album is a lot more authentic, a lot more organic and soulful. The way I wanted it to be, the songs all talk about a different story and different situations that anybody could go through, it’s not all happy, happy love songs. Some songs have something a little more deep, a little more taboo so I think it speaks about, like I said earlier, it speaks about different sides of my personality like yeah I’m living the dream and I’m a happy person and I have a good life but I’m also human, I have ups and downs all the time, sometimes I can be angry and see everything dark and I’m in a huge rut and in a bad mood so I just want to show the public that I have all those sides because I’m human. I want to be realistic and I want people to related to my songs and think “hey I remember when that happened to me” or “wow she’s singing about the way I felt 2 months ago” you know? It establishes a closer contact.

CONFRONT: Yeah that’s true. Who has made the biggest impact on you so far in your life?

EVA: I have to say my parents for raising me and teaching me those values. My parents are definitely my heroes because they shaped me into the person I am today. My dad is like my friend, my accomplice, my number one mentor; he taught me how to sing and brought music into my life. My mom is like my confidant and my diary like I tell her everything. I have no secrets from her. They’re my heroes ’cause they brought me into this world and made me who I am, I wouldn’t be the happy and wholesome person that I feel that I am if it wasn’t for them. I’m just so lucky I have amazing parents such as them because I have some friends that aren’t close to their parents, they’re great people and I love them to death but I just find it so sad like I couldn’t imagine my life if I wasn’t close with my parents and didn’t talk to them every day.

CONFRONT: Thank you for the interviews, it was great meeting you!

EVA: No problem, thanks for coming by!

www.evaavila.com/