In his new album ‘Charlotte’, Montell Fish draws on personal experiences to explore narratives of fame and religion

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In his new album ‘Charlotte’, Montell Fish draws on personal experiences to explore narratives of fame and religion

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Raised in a religious household in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Montell Fish started out his musical career as a Christian rapper. However, after he began to feel boxed in by the genre’s strict rules expectations, he moved to New York to experiment with new sounds and tell new stories. Now, he’s known for producing highly emotive songs that respond to his personal experiences and heartbreaks while also speaking to universal experiences. Take ‘JAMIE’, his 2022 album, as an example, which Billboard described as a “gallery of unfiltered desperation.”

 

Montell Fish recently shared his sensitive sound with us during his debut A COLORS SHOW performance of ‘Don’t You Love Me?’, a track that will feature on his upcoming album ‘CHARLOTTE’. In line with the release, we sat down with the artist to discuss working smarter not harder, the importance of selflessness in art, and how there’s still an acknowledgement of the divine in his musical creations.

You started making music when you were around 16 or 17 after a tumultuous period of heartbreak and difficulty, including getting thrown out of your mum’s house. Tell us about this period.

I wasn’t doing too good in school and didn’t have a lot of promising qualities. My parents were like, “you need to get it together or you’re not going to be ok in life.” So I downloaded a beat making program called FL Studio and tried to learn how to make beats. I made a mixtape called ‘My Friend’s Couch’ inspired by the fact that I was always over at my friend’s house, sitting on his sofa, and smoking. I wanted to make something that resonated with my situation at the time. I deleted it a few years later, but that was the beginning of my journey with music.

That said, I’ve always loved music. My dad was into rappers like Lil Wayne, Carter Three, and Tupac when I was younger, while my mum always played R&B and gospel tracks by artists like Fred Hammond and Boyz II Men.

Speaking of gospel, your mum was very religious. However, it took you a while to connect with the God she had such a close relationship with. How did you come to find your faith? 

I went through my first existential crisis when I was 17. I felt like everything was meaningless and didn’t know why I was here. That’s when I came up with my artist name, Montell Fish. I felt like a lost fish swimming in the ocean.

I started praying because I was so low. After that, I dedicated myself to Christianity and Christian music for around four or five years. I didn’t want to curse in my music anymore, or talk about sex or sinful behavior.

Why did you stop pursuing that path? 

When I was in the Christian space, there were a lot of boxes that I had to stay in and so many rules that people held me to. There were even chord progressions I used that people said were bad because they reminded them of certain anti-Christian ideas. I started wondering why I was limiting myself and abiding by rules that didn’t even seem biblically accurate. In 2021, I moved to New York away from all of my church-going friends. I felt like I needed space from all that, and to be around people who had a passion for what they did. I kept an acknowledgement of the divine in my music, but I started to allow myself to tell different stories.

You’ve still kept all of your Christian music online despite drastically changing your musical style. In an age where many of us curate our lives and delete sections of our past, why is it important for you to keep this part of your story public?

I like the honesty and progression of it. There’s a perception from my older fan base that I’ve drifted away from my faith. My music kind of supports that, because it’s sonically darker. I like this idea. It feels like a fictional character arc, even though it’s my reality.

Some artists think their fans can’t sense authenticity. I think you always need to have a little bit of relatability in there. That’s the role of an artist.

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Your music now encompasses references to genres including R&B, gospel, hip-hop, and rock. Despite this, you still release your music under the Christian genre on streaming platforms. Why?

My album ‘Jamie’, which came out in 2022,  was the last project I released under the Christian genre. It was about a breakup I went through, and still about God in a way. I loved Lauryn Hill’s ‘Miseducation’ album. To me, some songs on there sounded like R&B tracks, while others sounded like she could be singing to God. With this as a reference, I felt ‘Jamie’ could still be classed as Christian.

‘Jamie’ was described by Billboard as a “gallery of unfiltered desperation following love and loss.” What do you feel healing about sharing such painful emotions with your listeners? Other artists have talked about the difficulty of opening up in their music, but it seems to come naturally for you. Maybe it goes back to your need for honesty and relatability we talked about?

I think you said it! With ‘Jamie’, I wanted to think about myself a little less and create something for people who were going through similar experiences to me. I tried to incorporate some selflessness into it. As an artist, you can make whatever you want. You can write songs in a language that no one speaks and that can be your thing. But I think that it’s sometimes good to be selfless and try to think about your audience. That’s what I was trying to do.

I’m interested in your songwriting process. You’re known for the clarity and simplicity of your lyrics, which you often write very quickly, right?

I love Prince. I saw a video online that said he would write songs in one day and then never touch them again. There was something about that that resonated with me. I’ve found that often, when I try to write a song, I’m in one emotion, but when I come to it six days later I feel completely different. Some people are good at conjuring up feelings again, but I think it’s good to get everything all out in one go. That’s the way I’ve worked for most of my projects. Recently, I’ve been thinking a lot about how to work smarter, not harder. There’s only ten songs on ‘Jamie’, but I probably wrote 800 in order to get to them.

Tell us about ‘Don’t You Love Me?’, the song you performed for us on COLORS. 

‘Don’t You Love Me?’ will be on the deluxe version of my new album, ‘CHARLOTTE’, which comes out in September. This track represents a lot of what the album is about. It’s about loving someone or something even though they don’t love you back. Why are you so attracted to something that hurts you? That’s what I’m trying to figure out, particularly in terms of fame and religion. I want to figure out how much of these things are good, and how much distance you need from them to stay healthy.

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“I kept an acknowledgement of the divine in my music…

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… but I started to allow myself to tell different stories.”

In ‘CHARLOTTE’ I’m playing creatively with the narrative of falling away from God that my old followers came up with. Maybe they’re right, maybe fame isn’t the best thing for me and my ego. I’ve met a lot of people in the music industry, and some of them are good but others are fake. I’ve worked hard for what I’ve got, but do I really want it? It’s all very chaotic. I think it’s my most experimental album to date.

Do you have a favorite lyric from ‘Don’t You Love Me?’? 

There’s part of Psalm 23 in there. I like the fact that people may sing along and not realize they’re quoting a bible verse.

Beyond the release of ‘CHARLOTTE’, what are your ambitions for the future? 

I want to make worlds. I want my live shows to feel like plays, like experiences. That’s going to take a lot of money. I hope I can get the budget to do that stuff one day.

Finally, what is the one piece of advice you’d give to aspiring musicians? 

Be free. Allow yourself to experiment and to be a vessel. Get out of your own head. If you do that, and love what you do, you’ll always be happy and want to stay in the race.

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Montell Fish is a Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-based singer-songwriter whose A COLORS SHOW performance of ‘Don’t You Love Me?’ was released on 15th August 2024. Watch the show on our YouTube channel.

 

Text: Emily May
Photography: Brandon J Minton

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