Most indie artists would try to hide their suburban roots. Singer-songwriter and guitarist Meg Elsier, who grew up in Westborough, Mass., a town 40 minutes outside of Boston, thinks it fuels her edge.
“I’m not really afraid of being thrown out of place and not knowing what the hell’s going on, because I grew up in a little bubble,” Elsier said in an interview with The Beacon.
After attending Berklee College of Music, Elsier moved to Nashville, Tenn., to pursue a music career. While she was initially drawn to the music city for folk and bluegrass, she soon fell for its more low-key indie scene. But even after moving to Nashville, it took eight years for her to release her first record—she spent the bulk of that time playing gigs before developing her own sound.
“I was waiting so long for it to not be scary anymore, and that never happened,” Elsier said. “I had wanted something out there for so long and I was just too afraid to do it—then I got sick of it.”
In June 2024, Elsier released “spittake,” a record that feels like eight years of ideas and experiences prepared in a slow cooker. It varies widely from track-to-track between styles—a little grunge, a little folk, a little shoegaze—and volume levels, and her songwriting is personal to the point of solipsism: subjects include past relationships, the East Coast, parties that suck, and Catholicism.
And on Nov. 11, 2024, she performed at The Rockwell in Somerville, marking her first show back in Boston. There she played songs from “spittake,” along with an unreleased track about lawns, to an intimate audience. The set was part of her tour with Chicago-based band Finom.
Playing at The Rockwell was not only a full-circle moment, but a celebration. Elsier had always wanted to be a musician, but even after she bit the bullet and committed by moving to Nashville, the journey wasn’t straightforward. So now, having released her debut album and on a celebratory tour with Finom, Elsier sees a brighter path ahead.
“I spent 18 years kidding myself: ‘Oh, I’m going to be an art historian, I’m going to be a pilot, I’m going to be a nurse,’” Elsier said. “It was my senior year of high school, when I had to commit to the next four years of my life, that I decided I wouldn’t be happy doing anything else.”
Her journey with music is more or less a journey of self-acceptance. It’s not out of laziness that she performs under her government name: Elsier sees her musical project as her introduction to the world.
“I’m over not being known,” Elsier said. “Everyone’s gonna find out everything about me. If you find my TikToks, it’s a lot of me being high doing things—they’re not music industry TikToks. Mine are like, I got my wisdom teeth taken out and I’m gonna film that and show the world.”
Fashion, which for her involves more costumes than is common for an indie act, is a large part of this. Elsier, whose biggest inspirations include Björk and Crazy Frog, sees style as pivotal to her artistic and individual expression.
“Even when I was afraid to sing songs, the way I dressed, did makeup, or presented was super important to me,” Elsier said. “I felt like I could always express myself, because I don’t mind shifting all the time. You can be super trendy or super basic, really masc or really femme—it’s so fun to play with.”
Many eclectic influences inform Elsier’s art: Warren Zevon was a formative musical influence, as his music was big in the Elsier household. She also takes inspiration from her favorite movies, which include “2001: A Space Odyssey” and “The Cable Guy.”
“To be honest, I grew up going to a lot of Broadway shows because my grandma got us tickets,” Elsier said. “But I think that’s why I love a performance, a costume, and a fucking show, because that was super influential to me.”
Her off-kilter, label-averse sensibilities have found a home in the Nashville indie scene. The city is commonly known as the home of country music, but that umbrella allows for a flourishing DIY scene. The indie artists living in Nashville form a tight-knit community that is never afraid of being whatever it wants to be.
Elsier dove headfirst into her musical journey, as many aspiring creatives do, but she’s happy to learn new things. “spittake,” an album full of contradictory sounds and subject matters, reflects this—it encapsulates all the messiness inherent to being a human.
“I still feel like I’m gonna throw up every single time I go on stage,” Elsier said. “But I had to realize that it never gets easier—it just gets way more worth it.”
