Music Review: Q&A with Wilmah

Artist: Matt Connoly and Will O’Connor

Genre: Alternative/Indie

Wilmah is a band with a sound as deep as their lyrics. I sat down with them to talk about their recent EP release, how they started out and the story and method behind this unique sound. Comprised of two passionate college students Matt Connolly and Will O’Connor, Wilmah is not your typical Indie-Pop band.

In a day and age filled with shallow lyrics and almost irritable beats, Wilmah looks to change the description of what it means to be an “Indie-Pop” band. Having released three singles as of now, they are on the right track. The releases have a solid mix of dancing in your room all the way to wanting to cry in your room. “Nothing to Say” is a very introspective personal song, so much so that when I asked Matt if the song was about someone, they both laughed and quickly said, “No comment.” Then, you have “Pretty Boys” and “Forever” with equally as deep meanings but instead have the beat that makes you want to get up and dance.

Q. How did you become a band and how did you meet? What’s the story behind that?

Will: “We went to middle school together. I was in eighth grade; he was in sixth. I was already playing guitar, and then he started playing guitar, too. So, we met each other there.”

Matt: “We played in a middle school rock band put together by the band teacher. That turned into a band in high school, and then Will and I started writing songs together.”

Q. Where did the name Wilmah come from?

Matt: “Originally, we were called Call Waiting, and then one day my mom said we should call ourselves Wilma, like a combination of our names. But there was already a band called Wilma without the ‘H,’ so we added an ‘H’ at the end.”

Q. Who does most of the writing? Is it a collaboration between the two of you?

Will: “It honestly just depends. If we come up with something good, we turn it into a song. So, whoever got whatever is cool.”

Matt: “Mostly we start out with a synth part, a progression or a drum loop. Then, we keep building the production. I’ll work on the words and put some melodies over it. It’s a very gradual thing.”

Q. I know you [Matt] were explaining how you use so many different objects in your music to make the sound. Where did that idea come from?

Matt: “It’s just different people that we like. Maggie Rogers uses a lot of cool sounds. It’s just like a lot of weird samples. For example, I was on a plane the other day, and I heard the airplane beep and, I put it in one of our new songs. It’s just things that I hear and think ‘that would be cool in a song.’”

Q. Who are some of your inspirations in music?

Matt: “We really look up to John Mayer, Michael Jackson, Maggie Rogers, Prince, BORNS and the 1975. Matty Healy is like Jesus Christ to me.”

Q. When the two of you are writing, is there a certain setting you like to put yourselves in to get more inspiration?

Matt: “It’s all done on the fly. My notes app on my iPhone is just a mess of random ideas and lyrics.”

Q. What’s the song you are most proud of that either you have released or haven’t?

Matt: “We’re really proud of “Nothing to Say.” Also, as a pop song, I really love “Forever.” “Nothing to Say” is a pop song, but it’s different. And the new stuff we’ve been working on is really good, too. We’ve just been getting better and better at production, so I’m really excited for the future stuff, too.”

Q. When did you record your first song?

Will: “I think it was three summers ago. It was a terrible song. I had a job over the summer around three years ago, and this co-worker was like, “You should write a song about a lawn chair.” She was just making a joke. So, I took her up on it and made a song about it. Then, we realized that we could make better music than this. So, during the winter of my freshman year of college I sent him [Matt] some work, and it turned into this really cool song.”

Matt: “As Call Waiting, we released two songs, then we removed them. We’re eventually planning on re-releasing one song, but that was the first legit song we did together.”

Q. Are you excited for this EP release coming out?

 Matt: “We’re excited. The cover art is really dope.”

Will: “We’ve got really cool promotion stuff for it, too, which is even more exciting. I get really excited by that stuff. It’s just really fun to share our vision with everyone else.”

Q. Do both of you do the cover art together?

 Will: “To be honest, I’m not really involved. I give a little bit of input to Matt’s girlfriend and her brother. They’re really good at what they do.”

Matt: “They did the ‘Pretty Boys’ cover. I did the ‘Forever’ cover. The aesthetic of our band is just as important as our sound. We want to switch it up, obviously. With the singles, there’s this consistency, but with the EP, it’s going to be something totally different.”

Q. Talking about “Pretty Boys,” what’s the song about? Is it from a girl’s perspective?

Matt: “I remember I was getting a piece of pizza, and I was thinking about the song, and I had this lyric in my head: ‘I just want all the pretty girls to like me,’ and I thought no one wants to hear a [guy] singing about wanting girls to like him. So, I switched it, and it completely changed the meaning. The song’s about insecurities and wanting to feel good enough for the people and yourself.”

Q. What is the biggest thing you bring to the table that other bands don’t?

 Matt: “We’re still making pop music, but we want it to be sincere, genuine and have meaning. The songs have a deep meaning to me; people tell us that our songs are helping them. So, I think if it’s something I’m feeling and someone else is feeling as well, that’s a big part of it. I think sonically we do a lot of things different than other bands. It still fits in the genre, but there’s such diversity in our songs it has a little bit of everything. It has this nice mix.”

Will: It’s so exciting cause y’all have no idea what we’re going to be doing next. We don’t even know what we’re doing next.

Matt: There is a consistency with our sound, but there isn’t at the same time, and bands like the 1975 do that very well. They sound like the 1975, but they do a lot of things on the same album and the same bodies of work, and that’s what we want to do. If someone were to say, “Y’all have to start just making songs like this,” I don’t think we could do that. Because we have so many different inspirations and influences at the same time, it just comes out differently in every song. And that’s what being a human being is like, it’s not a one-way street.

Q. What are both of your long-term goals for this year after the EP releases?

Matt: “We really just want new fans, like new people listening to us who haven’t listened before. We’re going to start recording more, because we want to release even more music in 2019.”

Reese Gorman is a sophomore journalism major from Schertz, TX. He is passionate about music because he believes it has a unique way of bringing people together and it brings him joy. Reese’s favorite artist is The 1975 and his favorite genre of music is Indie/Alternative. In his free time, Reese enjoys golfing, climbing, camping and reading.