"I guess it was just one of those things where once you started doing it, I just always kind of kept on doing it," Luke Henry said about making music. "It's just something I do."
Henry is as straightforward as they come.
When discussing how his music is made he doesn't make a fuss about the intricacies. The ins and outs of his process are pretty direct. He doesn't mull how a song is made or even the writing process. Henry has found a way that works for him. "I think I used to try to write with a pen and paper when I first started writing songs, which was never natural to me," Henry said. "And eventually I just learned to use my memory and use what came out through the process of elimination find which things work and which don't."
You could even say where he records _ in his basement studio _ removes all typical requirements of being a performing musician today. He doesn't require a fancy setup, because he works as a studio engineer when not making his own music.
This basic ethos even applies to naming his music. Henry has an EP set to drop within the next couple of months. Although the recording is complete, he has not settled on a name. But he's not too stressed. "Do you wanna tell me what the title of my EP is? I'd love to know what to call it," he said. Likely, he'll just name the EP after one of the songs because it's less about the specifics of the music, and more about what type of music he's trying to create.
For this new EP that means southern glam. Henry cites '70s artists such as T. Rex, as well as more contemporary acts (Wilco) as influences for his latest music. Tempowise, it means the music is a little more upbeat than the more traditional singer-songwriter fare that he favored on past releases.
"Releasing stuff under your own name is weird. It's like you, but at the same time, it's not really you," Henry said. "It's still me at the end of the day. With the singer-songwriter thing, either way, you're going to listen to somebody change. Hopefully to the best."
It's not necessarily an experiment so much as it is Henry demonstrating his ability to switch between sounds, different instruments and intentions with the music. "You can only work on something for so long until your creative gas runs out anyway, either for that particular thing that you're working on or just in general."
In fact, change is a fundamental aspect of his songwriting process. In order to combat writer's block, he switches things up, whether that means changing which song he works on, or which instruments he uses to create the melodies. "When you hit a roadblock, it's best to have something to work on. If you have something to work on, just work on that," he said. "That's another thing I've been trying to get better at. Just get the ball rolling."
So maybe, despite what Henry says and how he approaches music, he's in fact deliberate with his creative decisions. And just because those choices lack the specificity that mark those of his peers does not mean that they are any less interesting or important to the creation of Henry's catchy, memorable music.
