There’s a theory that’s been explored in both academic and enthusiast circles that those who have a near-death experience tend to discover a greater appreciation for life following the incident. For Chicago-born, Virginia-based singer-songwriter Heddy Edwards, it was a car accident (where, thankfully, everyone survived) that was the catalyst behind her renewed sense of creative freedom. Prior to that, she hadn’t written a song for ten years, instead turning to poetry as an outlet, but now she’s been able to unblock her songwriting capabilities. The result is her new EP, The Other Side of Hell Is a Heaven So Delicate., a collection of five tracks in which Edwards navigates grief, mental health, creative identity and the role of hope. With her distinctive blend of metrical lyricism and dream-pop meets indie-rock textures, this talented artist uncovers the beauty in our darkest moments. This theme of hard-won optimism comes through in the light at the end of ‘black tunnel’, the metaphysical messages in ‘Dreamcast’ or the timeless courage in ‘Fever, can believe it’. It’s also interesting to find out about Edwards‘ broad sources of inspiration, from film (as in ‘Cinematic vision’) through to memory and the subconscious. Naturally, we wanted to know more about this transcendental project where the veil between the day-to-day and the ethereal appears paper thin. And so, for On The Record, we caught up with Heddy Edwards to discuss the EP’s themes, her songwriting process and the personal experiences that shaped this remarkable comeback record.
Welcome to Unrecorded! For those who aren’t already familiar with Heddy Edwards, can you introduce yourself?
Yes, hello! My name is Heddy Edwards and I am an indie pop-rock artist, poet, and producer, originally from the south suburbs of Chicago, now living in the DC area. I’ve been releasing music since 2021.
Congratulations on the recent release of your new EP! For those discovering you through The Other Side of Hell Is a Heaven So Delicate. for the first time, how would you describe this release in three words?
Thank you! I would say: wistful, mystical, and visceral.
The EP has such an interesting title, almost like a dissertation thesis, so how does this represent the journey listeners will go on?
The EP has five tracks and the tracklist actually goes from mental ‘hell’ to being able to find happiness again in daily life amid depression and grief. It starts a little darker, sonically, with “Black tunnel” and “The other side of town”—two songs about feeling alone or othered, and angry or desolate about it. “Cinematic vision” is the middle, the turning point—and I think you can feel that relief and reset in the production with the rain sounds and the organic, warm pop-rock sound. In “Cinematic vision,” I was actively grieving but learning that my grief and depression have actually deepened my ability to feel gratitude and joy. I realized that my mental health issues have made me a highly empathetic, perceptive, and creative person, and they have framed my life in many positive ways, even when I didn’t think so. Then, the record ends with two sonically brighter songs, “Fever, can believe it” and “Dreamcast,” which although they also have some darker themes, are ultimately about finding a light because of the dark. I was inspired to write “Fever” after watching some Old Hollywood movies about romantic love the courage to leave a suffocating home life. And although the lyrics to “Dreamcast,” the final track, could be seen as quite sad, the song ends with more of a weightless-feeling outro that is almost like an incantation, where I am resolving—no matter how many times I feel I am failing—to never give up.
These tracks are rooted in the idea that grief and suffering can deepen our ability to experience beauty and gratitude. Was that realisation difficult to arrive at personally?
It was. I think it took a lot of time and repeating the same situations that yielded the same results over and over to get to the heart of it. I had been afraid of grief my whole life, as someone who already feels quite a bit of sadness and doesn’t always want to get out of bed on a normal day. But what made me finally learn that lesson was when I had to face grief—both in myself and those I love—head-on after a loved one received a terminal diagnosis. I saw how gracefully my ill loved one accepted their fate and how much joy they still were able to feel on a daily basis by following their normal routines—even after receiving such devastating news that would leave anyone devoid of hope. One day, when I was especially sad while caring for our loved one, my husband and I went to fill up our car with gas, and as I sat in the car waiting for him, I listened to the rain softly fall and felt an immense wave of gratitude for simply being alive and doing something so mundane. As someone with depression, that feeling was particularly profound for me, and I opened my notes app and wrote a short poem that had the album title in it, “the other side of hell is a heaven so delicate,” and I knew that was my subconscious teaching me a lesson about sorrow strengthening joy, even when that joy is fragile.
Another key theme is mental health, which you explore through imagery and metaphor, so did you find comfort in putting down these thoughts and feelings?
I did, and I think I write about mental health more than any other topic—even when a song is about love, the underlying thread, for me, always leads back to my mental state and my relationship with myself and how it frames the other relationships in my life, for better or worse. I do a lot of automatic writing, where I keep whatever words come to me as I’m writing melodies, and oftentimes they seem nonsensical, but they always carry a shocking amount of meaning that is begging to be pieced together. I honestly learn the most about myself and my own thoughts and feelings through songwriting, more than anything else in my life. Although I am highly emotional and extremely sensitive, I am someone who is not always sure of what emotion I am feeling at any given moment, but once I reflect on it and write a song, I am able to sift through the static and discover what I actually felt. It is the greatest—sometimes most devastating—magic trick! But once I can understand a chapter, I can close it, move forward, and improve. Writing has been the most powerful impetus for me to accomplish that.
As a published poet, do you approach songwriting differently than poetry, or do the two forms naturally bleed into each other for you?
I do approach them differently, and I respect them each as very different art forms. Although I may take a phrase from a poem I wrote and put it in a song, I could never really see a situation where, for me, I could make a one-to-one transfer and turn one of my poems into a song. In poetry, there is so much to consider—the pacing, the use of line breaks or textual oddities; there are no guardrails at all, and the perfectionist in me does not know when to quit because of that, and my revisions feel endless. But in lyric-writing for songs, it feels like I am focused more on filling in a puzzle, which is often that I only have two or three syllables to match the rhythm, and I need to find the perfect word to describe what I am feeling or trying to say within those defined parameters. For that reason, it is easier for my perfectionist brain to decide the work is “done” once it fits neatly into that outline. But for that reason, poetry, to me, also feels a bit freer. I believe that writing poetry and forcing myself to think out-of-the-box has made me a stronger lyricist. Although I know that my lyrics could not necessarily exist as true poems, I take great care to craft them with that same rigor, and I do hope that they do feel more like poetry or literature to whoever cares to read them. I try to bring strong imagery, layered meaning, intuitive feeling, and abstract elements into my songs, which I first learned by writing poems. My deepest wish is that a room full of people could individually analyze my lyrics and that each one of them would come away with a different, personal meaning from the same lines. And that is exactly what I also love about poetry—you can offer vague vignettes of an image to evoke a feeling, but the feeling is transient and shapeshifting, only to be defined in the mind of the beholder.
Self-isolation and emotional withdrawal comes to the fore in ‘Black Tunnel’, so how did this track come together?
When I am strumming the guitar, whatever mood the chords evoke in me causes me to recall random memories or scenes, and in this case, this combination of chords brought to mind one of my core childhood memories. I can’t remember what year it was, but my parents were helping me to throw a Halloween party. My mom was in the basement finishing the decorations, and I was upstairs in our very dimly lit living room, already in costume and waiting for guests to show up. I turned on the record player and just spun around to music for what felt like hours but was probably only 20 minutes. I think about that feeling often as a metaphor for my life, that “black tunnel” of spinning alone in the living room as an only child held a kaleidoscope of emotion—I felt at once elated, lonely, hopeful, isolated, expectant, yearning, anxious, and devastated. That matches so perfectly with the theme of the record, that an experience can at once feel like one of our happiest and saddest. Recalling that image and parties like it sparked a reflection on friendships I’ve had throughout my life, particularly how my mental health caused me to isolate myself or feel othered. I’ve lost a lot of friends because of my own personal issues, but at times, I think old friends misunderstood me and made me the butt of the joke. Getting past this anger while also suffering an ego death, and taking responsibility for my part in various endings, was an important lesson in my life.
It might be tough to choose a favourite, but is there one track that feels closer to you?
I would say the unreleased song that is coming out with the EP, “Fever, can believe it.” I love that it is intimate yet grand and dynamic—I think it manages to capture that same duplicity in my personality. I felt something special emerge when I recorded the belted outro, like it was the best I had ever sang in my entire life. I felt like I tapped into something divine within myself, at least something more visceral than I had previously allowed myself to. My co-producer Alan Day helped to encourage me to let loose, because I am a notoriously abstemious perfectionist. I think you can feel that energetic unlocking in that moment on the record, and I want to use that as a guidepost for what comes next.
What else do you hope that listeners will take away from The Other Side of Hell Is a Heaven So Delicate.?
I really hope that it not only makes people feel less alone, but that it encourages them to realize that no situation is purely bad or good. We need sorrow to fully experience all of happiness and gratitude’s intricate dimensions. Impending grief, the painful knowledge that everything—even ourselves—is ephemeral, is what makes life feel so expansive, urgent, and ineffable. I think it is what is what drives us to love, create, and explore so deeply. I hope it helps any listeners to realize that every state of emotion is fleeting, and no matter what we feel, we will be on the other side of that sometime soon, with greater knowledge and experience, ready for the next turn of the wheel. I am not religious, but I do believe we are constantly being molded and prepared to handle what comes next, and become who we are meant to be. Even in the darkest times, you can find a fragile light and nurture it.
Following the release of this album, what will be next on the horizon for you?
I am focused on trying to release the album on physical media… Hopefully more to come on that soon! But I am excited to write my next record—this one taught me so much, about myself, life, and music, and I know the next one will too.
You can also find EP track ‘The other side of town’ in our Shades of Pop playlist.
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