Vanity Project (Side 2) by Cyrena Wages

This is the second side of Vanity Project but Cyrena Wages is not finished. She has new music coming out this summer and plays live regularly in Tennessee. She remains a Memphis musician to her core. She is an artist and a musician first but a successful businesswoman a close second. Now in her thirties, she speaks to Jamie Rodriguez, a local celebrity, with utmost candour. She knows that to be successful artistically without the cushion of a record company requires money. It's a business at the end of it all. In case you missed Side 1, you can catch up below.

Without further ado, here is Side 2!

Elvis Presley

Well, it had to be done. You cannot grow up in Memphis and then not sing about the King on your first record. I have seen others call Cyrena the Queen. It's kind of fun to do that, it might be just a little premature, but let's see. I don't know of another female singer who had the chance to go to Nashville, seized the moment, and then checked out of the machine. She went back home. Home means so many things, but it is a brave thing to leave home and create a new life. What is even more brave than that is to admit you made a bad choice, and to come back home. Even bad choices come with important lessons. Memphis has a thriving music community without the insanity of Nashville, and this song is one reason why Cyrena lives there.

I'm sure this is the track with the GarageBand drum loops. Even Matt Ross-Spang couldn't improve them! What these guys understand is that over-produced sounds are not musically better than simple ideas. The simple idea in this song is that her new man struts like Elvis. It's not a song about Elvis. I don't know if he is afraid of commitment or afraid of Cyrena but either way, he's not good enough for her.

But he walks into the room like Elvis Presley
And if I'm not Priscilla soon he's gonna lose me
Pretense, defenses, your exes
And oh my god, he's terrified

Heartbreaker

This is one of those songs where I wish I wasn't analysing the lyrics too closely. The words are much sadder than the tune. It's catchy, reflective and fun musically but I'm afraid Cyrena has found the wrong guy again.

Baby I swear I'm growing up
It's been a hard week
Stumbling out of dive bars
Every car is your car

Are you hanging on, does she do it for you?
Does she ask about me?
Is my slip still laying on your bedroom floor?
Can you hear me singing through the bathroom door?
I'm your songbird, baby ladadida

These are all questions, too many questions. This barrage of questions comes from a place of uncertainty, of low confidence. She's desperate. It's a sad song. It's a sad album. But remember this: she will bounce back.

Wes Anderson Love Story

Brilliant. Don't we all love Wes? I just saw The Phoenician Scheme. All of his films are eye-catching and this song will catch your ear.

And she said, honey is this a dream?
It's an accident, it's not supposed to be
But I am your plot twist lullaby
Let down your walls, I'll blow your mind
Baby take my hand, I got a surprise

Thank goodness for this song after those first two. Call Me (at the end of Side 1), Elvis and Heartbreaker were very deep holes. She's on the bounce now. This is cinematic, it's black coffee and it's nighttime outside. But Cyrena has a spring in her step again. There's a distance between her and the music now, a healthy distance. She can see the wood for the trees. It's quieter. I love this one!

Make Love to a Stranger Tonight

This is one of the saddest. I think it is just shaded by Call Me for sadness, but only just. She's that lonely. Let the music do the talking.

Back to the City

This is the longest song on the album. There is a very moving, sad live version of it which I recommend. She's going back to the city. Not just any city, but surely Memphis? She certainly is older than her time. We call them old souls, as I think you sometimes do. She's not quite Gen Z but was born in 1950. Were those times easier or just different to ours?

This is the song that helps us understand that the healing is nearly complete. We have brushes on the drums now. It's virtually acoustic. It's very good. The live version of Back to the City below was played after an in-depth interview with Jamie Rodriguez. It's a personal and emotional interview. Jamie says that Vanity Project has legs, no filler. He's not wrong. Indie artists cannot afford to include fat on an album. It is something I notice: the label-backed artists might put out three or four great songs and a lot of filler. It has been an issue with the album format since it was invented. But indie artists don't have that luxury. They can take their time to write and record. They can (and nearly always do) make ten incredible tracks on every album.

Cyrena had the chance to shop this album around the record labels and declined. This is a decision which is only possible due to the internet and social media. You can now go direct to your fans. It's not easy, and there's no easy route to the money you need to finance the show. It is the same conclusion I reached in 1998 when HarperCollins spent a year mulling over my debut novel. The Kindle did not exist but print-on-demand did. I went indie and all my fiction remains indie.

If your music, or whatever art you practice, does not fit into a small, neat marketing box, you will always struggle in the mainstream entertainment industry. As soon as you realise you can make a living and do your art on top of your day job then the goalpost shifts. Suddenly you can control the look, the photography, the branding, and everything around the art itself. This is ultimate artistic freedom. Even the most famous painters in history had their patrons. We have Patreon!

It is the artists who feel their feelings more deeply than you do. It's one reason they become artists. There are moments of sadness in this interview but the overriding conclusion is that Cyrena is a survivor. Whatever happens next in her life, her beach ball will always explode out of the pool at the speed of sound.

🎵 I got no one beside me
But I got fire inside me
I’ve come to terms with myself 🎵

The End?

As I come to the end of this deep dive, I console myself with the fact that new music is on the way. If It Ain't Broke and Find Out are already available and there are more coming. But Vanity Project is not done. It is so important to Cyrena. It is a truly great album. I hope that she isn't sad when she listens to it now, having moved on from the places where she wrote those songs. She sent me a message after the Side 1 article which I edited before showing you. It helps to summarise and classify this album in the eyes of its creator.

"Vanity Project is my little niche, artsy, pure, painful yet fun first baby and every word of that record is true and stained in tears and wine and trouble and wholesomeness all at the same time. I’m so proud of it."
Cyrena Wages

I felt sad as I read those words. Albums are like books. They take a year to write. Books are not recorded, unless you count the audiobook, but the process is so similar. As a man I can say it is worse than having a baby. It takes longer, and the burden might be mainly mental, but it is a heavy burden. Getting your truth out, or the story, or the characters you want to portray, fucking hurts.

As Hemingway said, if it ain't painful, they won't read it. He didn't say exactly those words but I am certain that's what he meant. Your listeners might not be musicians but they are human. They know when you know. If you're hurting hard, they will listen. Honestly, they really can tell. I know that Cyrena is happy for now. I only add the "for now" because artists are never happy for long. She's in a strong place but it's sad she had to go through the life chapter that is represented in Vanity Project, especially those beauty parades. They don't exist here, thank god. I don't know which universe thinks it is great for old men to ogle teenage girls. Surely those competitions belong in history's dustbin?

I'd like Matt to have the last word.

To quote Bob Dylan, she contains multitudes. I think is that she is one of the most caring, giving people I know. She is just as much worried about taking up your time or making sure you're okay even though we're cutting her super emotional song. You know she's very like a mama bear!

Cyrena's new tunes for 2025 have a dose of comedy and are less intense than her debut solo album. You can stream If It Ain't Broke and Find Out on all the usual. For UK readers I have precisely ONE compact disc of Vanity Project which I will send out (post free) to the winner of the prize draw. DM me on Instagram to enter. You can DM right now but the draw will happen later. There's only one condition: you need to love the music as much as I do.