We all have those artists and songs we hear that strike the right chord and make us fall in love at first listen. They’re the reason we refresh social media pages, tour schedules, and Spotify profiles — because we can’t miss a single release. This is Love at First Listen — a series introducing you to the emerging, and established, artists with new music guaranteed to upgrade your playlist.
We all know the giddy, giggly, swinging-my-feet feelings associated with a new crush. Get ready to reminisce on being seventeen again: Vancouver pop darling Madisyn Gifford captures all of the fear, excitement, and embarrassment associated with new love, this time experienced as an adult on her new summer single “Seventeen,” which dropped on a pretty significant day—her 24th birthday.
Love at First Listen caught up with Madisyn to chat about how the song came together in personal record time, why her next album will be her happiest yet, and which tracks fans might be most excited to claim.
First of all, happy belated birthday! How excited were you to celebrate the release of “Seventeen” on such a big day for yourself both personally and professionally?
I love birthdays so much. I love any excuse to celebrate. So, getting to have two things on that day was fun. I’ve also been out of the release cycle rhythm for a while. For three years I was putting out music pretty much every six to 12 weeks almost like clockwork, but I haven’t done it in almost a year now. It’s been a nice break and I’m excited to get back into it.
Can you take us behind the scenes of your creative process? You worked with Jared Manierka, who has worked extensively with artists like Carly Rae Jepsen. How long had you been sitting on this song and how much of it did you have in mind when you first went into the studio?
It’s funny because this is actually one of the most recent songs we’ve written for the record that we’re working on right now. I brought it to Jared two and a half months ago, which in record release time is not a very long time ago. We just had so much fun making it and it came together really quickly, which doesn’t always happen. I have a song on this record that we’ve been trying to make for almost three years. I wrote this myself on my guitar in like 10 minutes and then we made it into this fun little folky, sort of country-esque song, which is the music I’ve always wanted to make.
Your music is very fresh but nostalgic at the same time. It’s folk-tinged pop but you can also hear some country influences, especially on “Seventeen.” Who are some artists that you’ve loved at first listen as you shaped your sound?
My go-to answer is always Ani DiFranco. She was my songwriting icon my whole life. I literally think I learned songwriting from just listening to her discography on loop as a kid. The Chicks, love them so much. Taylor Swift… I’m a girl in her 20s, so she has been a crazy influence for me my whole life. “Mr. Jones” was my favorite song while growing up and Counting Crows is one of my favorite bands. The list could go on forever… Stevie Nicks, obviously. Come on!
This is the first single off a forthcoming album. How is it going, and where does “Seventeen” fit in its sonic world?
We chose “Seventeen” as the lead single because I feel like it is a decent representation of the entire record. This record is going to be my happiest album I’ve ever made. Don’t worry, there will still be sad songs, but it’s definitely the happiest one I’ve made thus far in my career. It’s going to be called ‘A Quiet Contemplation of Sunshine.’ It’s very summery and folky, but poppy still and very fun. It has lots of live instrumentation and not a lot of pop synth sort of production, which is new for me. So, I’m really excited.
You mentioned embracing a summer vibe. Can fans expect to hear more of the album soon?
We fought to try and get it done earlier this summer, but we’re still chipping away at it. It should hopefully be coming out in October, but there will be more singles and stuff to come throughout the summer for sure.
Ahead of your last record ‘Sleeping on the Ceiling,’ you said your only goal was to write songs that scare you. When you’re writing bits of lyrics in your Notes app and bringing those lyrics to life in the studio, how do you push yourself to be vulnerable and pour everything out on paper?
It’s interesting because with this record, I almost had the exact opposite mindset as I did on my last one. I’ve never been very good at writing happy music, but especially on this record because I’m in such a different phase of my life, I feel like I’ve kind of figured things out a little bit. In my mind, I’m not a teenager anymore. I’m a generally happy person now, which is cool—I worked hard to get there! I wanted to write an album that represented that, so I think my mindset going into this one was like, how can I truly represent what’s going on in my brain in my day-to-day life and not just delve into past things that I’ve already kind of sorted through? I don’t need to keep digging up that old stuff, you know. Whereas on ‘Sleeping on the Ceiling,’ I was still really trying to sift through things and figure out my stuff and it shows on the record. I was trying to figure out my brain and my trauma and what was going on up in there, but now I’m like, okay, I did that. Let’s move on!
Do you feel that writing and recording this music and putting it out helped you get through those emotions so that you are now in the position where the next record can be happier and more upbeat and all those things naturally?
100%. For new friends I meet, I’m always like, if you listen to my music in order, you’re going to be able to find out an absurd amount of things about me because [everything] is so autobiographical. When you go back through every record, they all feed into each other. Every single outro leads into the next intro, and they all tell a really clear story of my life from like, 20 years old and onward.
Have you started building the tracklist for this next record, and are there any song titles that might catch our eye?
Oh, that’s a really good question because I’m the same way. I love a good tracklist. I do have the tracklist pretty much done—not in order but done. The title track, “A Quiet Contemplation of Sunshine,” is going to be the first track. There’s also going to be a song on there called “Father’s Day.” That is the song we’ve been working on for like three years and just trying to make it work, but I think it finally works on this record. There’s another one called “Fast One” and one called “Overpriced” that I’m excited to share.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received about making music that you can pass along to anyone reading this who may want to follow in your footsteps?
Something I tell literally every single person I know is if you have kids or you know anyone who is thinking about going into the music industry and making music, please encourage them to write their own music. Write your stuff and get credits for what you’re writing because it’s everything. I don’t think people realize when they’re first starting out how much it matters. Pretty much one of the only ways that you can make money in this industry is through publishing, and it’s just such a special ability to have to be able to write not only for yourself but for others. Someone told me that when I was around 17 and I decided I wanted to do this. He sat me down and was like, the only thing I can tell you is just write as much as you possibly can. It just takes one song, if you get one song that does well, it’s all it takes. So, just keep writing.
To wrap up, where can people find and follow you online?
Everything is just madisyngifford with a Y instead of an O because my parents wanted to make things difficult for me. And my TikTok is maddyg.raps because that’s what people called me in high school!
