Luke Mitchem’s For You I Built a Mountain is a beautiful and outstanding album. He truly has the talent to express his creativity through music. However, that’s not the only talent he has. Not only is he a singer-songwriter, he also writes short stories. While speaking with Luke, he referred to himself as an “aspiring author”, and expressed interest in publishing some of his stories and poetry. As a writer, I absolutely loved hearing this and it piqued my curiosity about this multi-talented musician.
On your Instagram you posted a quote about fear and courage by Mark Twain. What does that quote mean to you personally?
I think going after a big dream, like music or any art really, there is uncertainty that creeps in from the edges. If you aren’t strong enough to strand up to it you’re going to fail your dream before you even get it off the ground. That quote was posted by a friend of mine.
What was the inspiration of your newest album, For You I Built a Mountain?
I think initially it started as a short story of the same title that I wrote after I had back surgery a couple of years ago. I wasn’t able to play music at the time so I started working on a short story by that name, and as I wrote the story I started randomly writing song lyrics in the margins. I kind of had some songs that were going to be on the next record, and a couple of songs came to light and I fell in love with the title and what it meant to me and what it could mean to other people and I latched on to it. I released the record in April. I still go back to extra songs we didn’t record and re-work them out and kind of in a way that the next record will be a part two of For You, I Built a Mountain and kind of be a carry on from the residuals that are still there from what I’m thinking and writing about.
I read you were musically influenced by Tom Waits and “all types of sounds”. What are those sounds?
Well I think Tom Waits is one of those inspiring musicians and I just find that he is hard to pigeon hole into a certain genre. I think it’s difficult for us to label ourselves and that’s what I love about Tom Waits and his music. I love that about him; some of the ways he produces music. He was frying bacon and recorded it. It’s being open to all kinds of musical sounds. Being more of an artist in a broader sense and allow other things to influence me in a broader sense.
I understand you’re also an author and that you had been working on two novels. What are your novels about?
The first one I wrote—I haven’t even published yet—it was more of a biography of just some things I had gone though in my life. It was one of those things where I wrote the draft and never looked at it again. It was therapeutic to just hammer out a story and see how it sticks. But I think more so recently like over a year and a half I’ve been into writing short stories and it all started with a short story, For You I Built a Mountain, it was very simple, there are three characters, the characters don’t have names, just “him” and “her” and a wolf that plays a pivotal part in the story. So from that first one I stated working on separate stories for “him” and “her” (For You I Built a Mountain) that’s been a longer process and I’m trying to weave all the narratives together so it makes sense. It’s taken more effort and planning. I see the importance to have structure when you’re trying to sit down and write it.
Do you write fiction or non-fiction?
With any fictional story, it has parts of your own life in it, at least for me I should say. I’m pulling bits and pieces of my own life and traits that I have incorporated into male characters. The female character is a combination of fellow musician friends, pulling all these qualities to form characters. It’s fun, the freedom to write and not focus on one particular muse and it’s fun to do. I want to do it right so someone will like it. It’s always best to write what you know. You know your friends and family, people you loved in your life. There’s so much rich content there, especially if you focus on the little things we as people do.
Who are your literary influences?
I would say currently, I’m a big Colum McCann fan. He writes a lot of interweaving stories. Cormac McCarthy, Louis L’Amour. I’ve been reading some Louis L’Amour and it makes me want to camp out in the west and be a cowboy a little bit. I’ve been reading Stephen Ambrose. It’s almost like a story when I read his stuff and I really enjoy that.
I read you write poetry and that you turned your poems into songs. Would you want to publish your poems as a book of poetry?
Yeah, that’s what I think as an artist, I’m trying to find ways to get my art out there. So one of the projects I’m working on while on tour is gathering all the poetry I wrote in college. Trying to put together this broad book of collection of poems and short stories and I would love to try to self publish it by next year. I need to allow myself enough time to edit and see how it all flows together. I would love to publish that stuff in the near future.
I read you composed the score for the 2012 indie film The Gift. What goes into creating a film score?
I really didn’t too much of an actual film score on that one. The film maker is a good friend of mine, Harold Jackson III, and he just used a few of my songs for the score. So it wasn’t really me sitting down putting music to the scenes or stuff like that. We did work on some score stuff and since I was new at it, we pretty much scrapped most of it except what I already recorded.
What was it like?
It was really cool to see the process of what actors go through, being there onset and just hanging out. You know, it was really an interesting side of art to see the lines they have to memorize, how they are between scenes. It was really interesting. It something that, you know, I would love to do some acting in the future just to kind of broaden my understanding of art in general and find another creative outlet.
Creativity flows in Luke’s veins. It’s clear that not only is he passionate about his music, but about branching out and trying new things. I honestly feel that this is what makes him a one of a kind artist. The fact that “For You I Built a Mountain” started as a short story shows that he has a lot of potential; not only as a musician and songwriter, but as an author as well. I’m excited to see what the future holds for Luke, both in music and the literary world.
For more information, check out Luke Mitchem,
- Official website – http://www.lukemitchem.com
- Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/lukemitchemmusic
- & follow him on Twitter @lukemitchem
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