"Walking the Road", track-by-track by Mara Sol
Photo credit: Alan Donald
It’s an understatement to say Walking the Road, my first EP, has been a journey. And a long one at that! I have been singing and performing on stage since I was 7 years old. Through high school and college I studied classical voice, but ended up pursuing marketing as a career, and I really didn’t sing much through my adult years. When COVID happened, I found myself drawn to spend the extra time we had learning something I’d always wanted to - guitar. As a vocalist, it’s quite intimidating to sing a-cappella (without instruments), and yet I never had more than a few piano lessons as a kid. It didn’t take long at all before, once learning some basic chords, songs just started to pour out of me. Clearly, I have a lot to say! In truth, it felt like I had found a missing piece to a puzzle I didn’t know I had been working on my whole life. Songwriting has become a way for me to say and be vulnerable about a lot of things that have been hard in life, and things that have been good too, in a way that I never thought was possible.
As someone who has come to songwriting, recording, and producing my music later in life (I’m in my 40’s), at first I was intimidated by how much I needed to learn in what seemed like no time to waste. I guess I’ve always had that imposter syndrome - not feeling I had much to say that anyone cared to hear. But I have found remarkable people in these past few years who’ve been nothing but supportive: in particular the LA Songwriters Collective, the musicians and producers I’ve worked with on this project (Melanie Medina, Ryan Frazee, and Tom Frampton), and my husband Alan - my number one fan. These people have given me the confidence to feel like I had something to say which others would want to hear, and that it’s never too late to tell your story.
I’d love to share with you a little more about each of the songs on Walking the Road. They are all little snapshots of my life - all based on a true story [though names and details have been changed).
The Road — I chose this for the opening song, because it’s one I literally wrote on the road with my husband, and is probably the most authentic you’ll get from me. It’s a song about finding love later in life, maybe even getting married for a second time - which was the case for me at 35. I had already lived an adulthood without this person; I had things that I thought I was going to do with my life that might play out differently if I take this path with this person rather than by myself. It’s like that movie Sliding Doors - if you take one path rather than the other, how will your life end up? Will you look back and say that was the right choice? Will you be happy? So this song was really a reflection of that time in my life when I knew I had to leave some things behind, but that by doing so I could journey a new road with this partner that means the world to me (who is now my husband - so that worked out!).
The Answer - When I got married later in life, part of what that road was included built in children, so I was really marrying a family of 3 (my step-children who I adore). We’ve been together since the kids were quite young, so I’ve had the chance to be a “mom” or at least an adult role model. A step-mom is an interesting vantage point because you can be a little more objective than a biological parent (at least I think) and because of that, I think the kids ask me for advice maybe more than they do their Dad or birth Mom. Or maybe that’s just me romantasizing! But whether they ask me or I give advice unsolicited, that is what this song is. It’s a letter to my kids, especially now they are entering adulthood. My only hope is that they don’t chase the external definition of success and rather trust in themselves - even with life’s most difficult questions like ‘what’s the meaning of this all’. I tell them “The Answer’s within you” - that’s about the only true thing I’ve learned in my life.
Waiting For You - Chronologically, this song might have gone first. It’s a story personal to me but is written in a more general sense. It seems to be not so uncommon for one to find oneself in the start of a romance, but one (or both) of the persons has something that’s holding them back from really committing. That could be anything from that they’re already in another relationship, something practical in life like geography, or even a fear of relationship. This song is written from the perspective of the person (ok, me!) who feels ready for the relationship but is left waiting for the other person to get to that same space.
Unresolved - Over time I’ve realized that in many relationships - especially romantic ones - we break up and yet there’s so much we feel wasn’t said, or unresolved. This song was originally written about a friendship that had gone sour. But I kind of amalgamated different feelings from different relationships into the lyrics. Sonically this song is different than most I write because it started first as a guitar chord progression that I fell in love with, and has a lot of dissonant chords which our ears want to hear resolved, but I don’t - I leave it wanting. Fellow musicians will likely catch this musical ‘pun’ of using unresolved chords in a song called “Unresolved.” You could say that’s my quirky humor making it’s way into my writing. Melanie Medina really helped me bring Unresolved to life with her musical arrangement and harmonies. She and Ryan had the concept of a Fleetwood Mac vibe, which has made this song one of my favorites. It’s such a joy to hear one’s song progress from five or six simple chords into such rich instrumentation. So I really credit her a lot for bringing this song to it’s current form.
Inside - This is a really special song to me because it’s a true expression of what songwriting means to me. I grew up with a fair bit of trauma - and I don’t talk about that a lot because it’s still quite hard. We were raised very poor, and my father had mental health issues which resulted in violence in the house from a very young age. My way of dealing with that was to get married at the age of 18, seeking safety in a male figure opposite to my father. By the time i was 25 I realized that even though my husband was a good person, I wasn’t in love with him. So I made a difficult choice to ask for a divorce, which only added more to my ‘trauma purse’.
Inside is really a letter to myself. The first verse are words to myself when bad things are happening to me (“Forgive the sky for the rain”), and the second verse is the words when I’ve been the perpetrator of causing someone else pain (“Shame, I need to feel the burn”). And yet in either scenario - getting through it is all about forgiveness - of others and most importantly of ourselves. Challenging times in our life require us to be very strong on the outside, almost detaching from our emotions lest we crumble entirely. In particular, women are often told to shut that voice down - as if our feelings and instincts are not valid. Don’t cry, be tough, we hear that voice said. And yet there is another internal voice saying: it’s ok to cry, it’s ok to feel shame. Embrace that side of yourself, but be gentle with yourself. Forgive. Forget. That is the strength to make it through I talk about. Musically, again I credit Melanie Medina for bringing this song to its full life with her arrangement and addition of the mandolin. For me that mandolin is my child self coming in to hear all these words of empowerment, and that feels like some closure.
So there you have it. A little peek behind the songs and a little window into me. I hope you will take a listen and find connection to some of my songs.
I cannot say thank you enough to the writers/producers on the EP: Melanie Medina - musical arrangements and all string instruments, Ryan Frazee - producer and mix; and Tom Frampton - sound mastering.