MARIAH. Seeks Answers On “Maybe,” Teases Upcoming EP & Spills On How She Balances Music & Medicine: INTERVIEW
Indecisiveness does not live here Mariah (stylized MARIAH.) says in her latest song “Maybe.”
“Say yes, say no, but know my love’s real for sure / Say yes, say no, but never say maybe,” Mariah sings on the chorus.
In the accompanying music video the singer shows how life is with or without the man she wants in her life. The simple day to day tasks become lonesome without him but she finds that she is better off on her own if she is only going to be loved halfway.
“I really feel like people today are very comfortable with living in a gray space in life because they're so scared of the ‘yeses.’ But we're so terrified. We're terrified of the ‘no’s,’” Mariah speaks on the theme of the song noting that it came from a place of personal discovery as well.
“I've been in that place. I feel like we've all been in that place. When, you know, you're in a situation if you really don't know what it is, but you want it to be more but you're scared on [knowing] what the other person may say. [However] you have to come away knowing that, I was always whole before I came into this. And I will be whole exiting this.”
It makes sense that Mariah would want definitive answers on a situation as she doesn’t have time between balancing the studio and the hospital. The emerging artist shared how she also was a full-time NICU nurse.
“I definitely have to say it's nothing but the grace of the Lord and the ability for him to give me strength, to be able to pursue, to totally complete different careers at the same time,” the singer said of her work at the hospital. She also shared how she plans to help future nurses in their careers. “Now I teach new new grads. I teach student nurses all while still pursuing my music career. So I really have the best of both worlds with music and medicine.”
How music became part of the the Louisana-bred singer’s life was simple, it started at home and the church. She explained that her mother was a large influence on pursuing music. The church choir is where she found her voice which she still serves up her gift “every Sunday at 10:00 a.m.”
“She has been producing different types of music,” Mariah said of her mother. “She's been involved in the choir and is actually a minister of music currently and she's been doing that since she was eight years old. So she's been doing that for quite, quite a while. But I definitely got my musical upbringing from her.”
“Maybe” is just a taste of what Mariah has to offer her fans. Her debut EP is scheduled “sometime soon” but she already has a clear message on how she wants her listeners to feel about her project.
“I want people to come away and I say this all the time, but I really do mean it. I want people to come away leaving full,” she said of her impending EP. “ I feel like music is such a very strong medicine in and of itself and contingent upon what you listen to. It can either heal you or it can make you sick and I like to be in the music of ministry. I like my music to really, really tell a story and people to come away with answers.”
She continued: “I really feel like with this EP that everybody is going to have something that they love. I really like to say that my EP is a melting pot of different ideas, of different types of music, different types of instrumentations, different types of stories. And so it's all just blended together. And I like to think that me as an artist, I'm very eclectic in my sound and so I really feel like people are going to come away loving something and everything. You know, some somebody can talk about a different topic with my EP so I'm so excited for it.”
Be sure to follow MARIAH. on Instagram and stream her music on Apple Music, Spotify, and Tidal.