Maggie Rogers performs in The Current studio
by Mary Lucia
October 29, 2018
Maggie Rogers' new album, Heard It In A Past Life, comes out in January 2019, but that doesn't mean fans will have to wait to hear the new songs. "We've been pretty much playing the whole record live, just because and I don't want to wait anymore," Rogers explains. "And I love these songs! And, well, I also just don't have that many songs out, so part of it is essential to the show, and part of it is essential to my own being. But yeah, we've been playing all these songs live."
Before her sold-out show at First Avenue in Minneapolis, Maggie Rogers stopped at The Current for a session hosted by Mary Lucia.
Rogers's career has advanced very quickly, kick-started by a viral video that captured Pharrell Williams' reaction to a song Rogers wrote while in her last year at New York University. That video helped Rogers to get a contract at Capitol Records. "Because of the momentum of that video, I had enough leverage to write my own contract," Rogers says. "And so I feel very comfortable in my record deal because I own my masters, and I have a very high amount of creative control, and beside that, I actually really love the people I work with, and it's been the right place for me."
Further evidence of Rogers's rapid ascent comes this Saturday, Nov. 3, when she'll appear as the musical guest on Saturday Night Live. To prepare, Rogers has been watching videos of previous SNL musical guests. "I went back and watched the Sugarcubes, I watched Alanis Morissette, I watched Stevie Nicks," Rogers says. "The best ones, people are just wearing very calm clothes. I think it's really easy to want to come out and wear something crazy, but I think it kind of distracts from the music, and SNL is so about the music."
Although the milestones have been happening quickly for Rogers, the singer-songwriter senses it may have been in the works for a long time; her album title, Heard It In A Past Life, is a reflection of that sense. "There have been so many just like strange, really beautiful powerful alignments of random things that have sort of brought my career to fruition, that over the course of the last couple of years, the only way I have come to explain it to myself or reason through it is that I just think I've been trying to do this for a very long time, and this is the lifetime it all sort of works out," Rogers says.
Use the audio player above to listen to the complete in-studio session.
More Video
Songs Performed
"Give a Little"
"Fallingwater"
"Light On"
All songs will appear on Maggie Rogers' album, Heard It In a Past Life, coming Jan. 18, 2019, on Capitol Records.
Hosted by Mary Lucia
Produced by Derrick Stevens
Engineered by Corey Schreppel
Visuals by Nate Ryan
Web feature by Luke Taylor
External Link
Maggie Rogers - official site
