Singer/songwriter Maya Engen is a breathtaking force of nature – a maximalist new artist with the vocal firepower, theatrical instinct, and emotional conviction to make every feeling sound larger than life. Her smoldering debut single “Fool,” the first taste of her upcoming EP ‘Just My Luck,’ channels toxic friendship and emotional exhaustion into a cathartic anthem we’ll be listening to for years to come.

Stream: “Fool” – Maya Engen

Every one-sided relationship eventually reaches a breaking point – the moment care curdles into clarity, when devotion gives way to something sharper, steadier, and far more necessary.

Maya Engen’s debut single “Fool” captures that exact moment: Not the quiet unraveling, but the snap. The realization. The decision. With a voice that smolders and soars in equal measure, the New York singer/songwriter turns emotional exhaustion into something electric, channeling hurt, anger, and hard-won self-respect into a song that feels as cathartic as it is commanding.

From its opening lines – “You’re wasted / Gotta pick you up from off of the pavement” – “Fool” drops listeners straight into the imbalance, painting a vivid portrait of care that’s no longer reciprocated, of energy poured into someone who only takes. It’s specific, cinematic, and instantly gripping, but what makes the song hit is what comes next: The refusal. As the chorus rises, so does Engen, flipping her frustration into a universally relatable mantra of reclamation – “Don’t you dare try to make a fool out of me.” What begins as vulnerability becomes something else entirely: A declaration.

You’re wasted
Gotta pick you up from off of the pavement
Gotta pull the cigarette out your mouth
Gotta hold you up so i dont go down

You’re a deadweight
You’re never gonna figure it out
Never gonna turn it around
Do i need to say it out loud

Released in late February via Giant Music, “Fool” arrives not just as Maya Engen’s debut single, but as a defining first step. Written in one of her earliest Los Angeles sessions with producer Shy Kid and songwriter Tor Miller, the track marked a turning point – the moment Engen felt herself stepping into focus, both sonically and emotionally. It’s the song that changed everything, the one that made her realize what her music could be, and the one that ultimately helped open the door to this next chapter.

“‘Fool’ is about being in a toxic relationship or friendship where you feel like you’re giving so much more than you’re getting,” Engen tells Atwood Magazine.

“You keep taking care of someone… and just exhausting every last bit of energy and love you have for them when they’re just simply not reciprocating.” That imbalance – repeated, internalized, and endured – becomes the song’s driving force, but what makes “Fool” resonate is the tension she refuses to resolve neatly. Hurt and anger coexist here, vulnerability and defiance locked in conversation.

That emotional immediacy is at the heart of everything Engen creates. A self-described maximalist, the 22-year-old NYU grad approaches music with a desire to feel – and make others feel – everything as deeply as possible, romanticizing even the hardest moments into something vivid and alive. It’s a perspective shaped by years of classical training in piano and voice, a background in musical theater, and a lifelong devotion to performance and storytelling. Now based in New York City, Engen blends soulful pop, country grit, and smoky jazz into a sound that feels both timeless and distinctly her own – rich, expressive, and rooted in the kind of raw emotion that can’t be faked.

Maybe it’s the way that you condescend
Or maybe its the way I’m so easy to bend
I lose you by the minute
You push me to my limit
Again and again and again

It’s not fair
You always do this to me
Cause I care
So sure I’d never try to leave
Stay right there
Gonna pull the rug from under your feet
Don’t you dare
Try to make a fool out of me

All this and more comes to life in her first song’s chorus, where Engen finally says what’s been building underneath: “It’s not fair… you always do this to me” she roars, voice radiating over percussive piano hits, thunderous bass, and thumping drums. Her words land as both recognition and release, but she doesn’t stay there for long – the line hardens, the boundary sets, and she pushes through with conviction: “Don’t you dare try to make a fool out of me.” As the fullness of her burgeoning artistry comes into view, everything she’s been carrying turns into something she won’t carry anymore.

She hears it, too. “It’s kind of the embodiment of those two voices fighting at each other in your head,” she explains – one asking how someone you love could hurt you this way, the other finally pushing back, insisting on something better. Writing the song became an act of reckoning as much as release: A way to name what was happening, to hold herself accountable, and ultimately to reclaim her independence.

“That chorus was a testament to, ‘you can’t make me feel bad about this anymore,” Engen says. “Like, I can say that it’s not fair that you did this to me, and I’m hurt by it, but I can also say that I’m gonna get my life back, and you’re never gonna do this to me again.”

“It’s really valuable to be able to own something that’s hard to admit, and being able to declare that, I think it’s just as powerful as saying you’re moving past something. I don’t think you’re truly ever moving past something if you’re not really accepting the feelings and thoughts that are the hardest to admit.”

That sense of reclamation pulses through every second of “Fool.” It’s there in the tension of her delivery, in the grit beneath the gloss, in the way her voice carries both the weight of what she endured and the strength it took to walk away. If the song begins in frustration, it ends in something far more powerful: Self-respect, hard-earned and fully owned.

“I was reclaiming my independence, and writing it, and especially being able to sing it, definitely helped me work through that situation,” Engen says. What started as something she had to work through became something she could stand on – and that’s exactly what she hopes listeners carry with them. “I want them to feel like the most confident versions of themselves when they listen to ‘Fool,’” she smiles. “I want people to listen to ‘Fool’ as if it’s their walkout song.” Not just a release, but a return to self.

Unfiltered, unflinching, and wholly unapologetic, “Fool” marks the moment where doubt gives way to clarity, and where choosing yourself stops feeling impossible and starts being necessary.

It’s a bold, brutally honest and ultimately empowering introduction, but more than that, it’s a statement: of intent, of identity, and of an artist stepping fully into her own voice. Maya Engen is no “Fool” – but she’s very much a star on the rise.

And “Fool,” as it turns out, was only the beginning. Since making her debut, Engen has released “Jade” and “Dumb,” further opening the door into the vivid, emotionally maximalist world she’s been building all along. Her debut EP, Just My Luck, is due out July 10, and together, these songs begin to sketch the contours of a first chapter defined by intensity, honesty, and emotional range – not a single mood, but a whole spectrum of feeling brought to life with color, conviction, and voice.

That range is especially clear in the distance between “Fool” and “Jade.” Where “Fool” channels anger into self-respect, “Jade” turns toward love, ease, queer joy, and the beauty of no longer feeling rushed. In our conversation, Engen describes the song as an expression of the first relationship where she felt like she had “all the time in the world,” and that contrast says plenty about the artist she’s becoming: One capable of turning betrayal into a walkout song and devotion into its own kind of open-hearted release. The emotions may change, but the feeling stays full-bodied.

This fullness didn’t come from nowhere. A classically trained pianist and vocalist with a background in musical theater, an NYU music business education, and early experience working around New York’s live music ecosystem, Engen arrives with both instinct and foundation. She speaks like someone still discovering the edges of her sound, but also like an artist who knows exactly how deeply she wants to feel – and how fiercely she wants her listeners to feel alongside her.

In many ways, our conversation with Engen captures her at the threshold: Looking back on the song that opened the door, while already stepping into the wider world of Just My Luck. Read our intimate interview below, and meet an artist who isn’t afraid to write about what scares her, sing through what shaped her, and turn the messiest parts of becoming into music that feels undeniably alive.

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:: connect with Maya Engen here ::

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A CONVERSATION WITH MAYA ENGEN

Maya Engen: Oh, wow, that’s such a broad question. To know about me and my music, I’m a maximalist at my core. I love to feel and experience everything very deeply and to the fullest as possible, sometimes to a fault.

In my music, I’m always trying to capture the core of whatever feeling or experience that I’m having, and I want people to know that every lyric and sound that comes out of my music is meant to be encapsulating a big feeling of passion that I feel.

I love all things art-related. I grew up being an artist as well, a painter. I’m super into fashion. I love to collect things. I have so many random collections. I love DIYing everything in my life, and I’m super outgoing. I can talk to anyone. I can talk someone’s ear off for hours, and I want my music to be fun and to make them feel confident and good about themselves. Even if it’s a sad song, I want them to feel the most romanticized version of that feeling.

Maya Engen: I was a musician, first and foremost, before I dabbled in songwriting. I was a classically trained pianist for nine years, and I also did voice for about nine years, but it was never pop. It was musical theater. I was a huge theater kid and grew up doing that.

The first time I really got my hand at songwriting was when I went to a composition camp, or band camp, so to say. It wasn’t a songwriting camp, though. It was a composition camp. We had music theory classes, chorus, all that kind of stuff. We had to learn how to make super composed, super weird, but fun and challenging music.

I chose to do songwriting for the pieces that we had to perform at the end of the summer. It was five weeks, no phones, and that’s where I learned to fully compose. Songwriting kind of came along with that, so I actually learned to songwrite by fully composing and arranging all of my music. I would handwrite all of the strings parts and the drums. I had to learn how to notate all of that, because at the end of the summer, I would have rehearsals and perform it in front of the whole camp.

Throughout middle school and high school, I was so busy being an actual musician that I never really had much time to explore songwriting as much. I was always a huge writer. I keep many journals. I always tell people that I keep my activities on me: I always keep my journal, my songwriting book, my sketchbook, and an actual book on me at all times. Whenever I’m bored or out doing something by myself, I always have something to stimulate my mind and inspire me.

By the time I got to college, I always knew I wanted to be an artist, but I didn’t have the portfolio to apply to Clive Davis or anything at NYU. So, I applied to music business, and I was like, “I’m gonna be smart and learn the intricacies of the business, so if and when I do finally decide to take the leap of being an artist, I’ll have a head on my shoulders.” And that’s exactly what happened, but I did not expect it to happen so soon.

When I got to college, I kind of just enjoyed college and took a break from all things music, aside from my major, obviously. Then I had an internship at Mercury Lounge and Bowery Ballroom in the city, which are two incredible venues, and I had to go to shows there once a week. That is what inspired me to start really taking songwriting seriously again, because it made me realize how much I missed performing and how much I missed being on a stage.

At my core, I am a singer and a performer, and that is what has brought me the most joy my entire life. I missed it so much, and so I was like, “If I’m gonna get back on a stage, I have to start songwriting.”

At first, I was so scared of it. I hated how vulnerable it was. I would get so frustrated and discouraged with myself. Then when I started doing shows with the few original songs I had, I started meeting more people that were musicians and artists. Once I started meeting the right people and getting into sessions, I learned that collaborating was actually what finally put me in the right mindset to be like, “Oh, wow, I love songwriting.” I think I just didn’t really have the confidence in myself at first to really believe that I could be a good songwriter, and then I started writing with other people, and I was like, “Wow, I can do this!”

Everything just took off from there. That was about two or three years ago, when I started doing it more seriously, but only in the last year have I started really doing sessions, and that’s when I was like, “Okay, I’m ready to go full throttle with this and give it everything.”

Maya Engen: We had multiple concerts throughout the summer that would be different things. Once I had to make a super weird electronic music kind of thing – not EDM or techno, but taking your recording device and walking around nature and taking those sounds and making some weird conglomeration of sounds to make a song, or a place, we would call it.

The festival piece was what we would do at the end of the summer, and that was when you had the creative liberty to do whatever you wanted. Some people would write full symphonies, some people would write chorus pieces. It was really whatever you wanted, but I really wanted to do songwriting, so that’s what I did. I added more musicianship and theory to it by arranging it, so it was really fun.

Maya Engen: If I play those venues one day, I’m gonna be like, “What? I used to work here!”

Maya Engen: It was so crazy, because in college, I studied music business, and I met so many artists. I had artists around me all of the time, and I was always kind of jealous in the back of my mind. I was like, “I wish I was doing that,” but I wasn’t ready.

Now, looking back on it, I would never have been ready for what I went through this past year a few years ago, let alone known what I wanted to say as an artist. I obviously had literal classes on all of these things, like how publishing works, concert management, and even writing in the music industry. I learned how to write press releases and all that kind of stuff. There was a class on music law and all that kind of stuff.

When I graduated, I fully was expecting to start working a corporate job. I was literally applying to jobs on roster in my senior year. That was also around the time where I was like, “Okay, I’m ready to start taking the artist thing more seriously,” but I had zero expectations. I was just like, “I need to post on social media. I need to start performing. I am not where I want to be with songwriting yet, and I haven’t really discovered my sound, but I do know that I can get up on a stage and entertain a crowd.” So that is just what I did.

I performed as many shows as I could, and that is what finally got me traction online. When I graduated, things were taking off online because a video of me singing an Amy Winehouse song went viral, and that’s how Will, my manager, found me. After that, everything literally changed. That video changed my life, and everything just took off.

Once I met Will, a bunch of other people started reaching out: managers, labels, publishing, all that kind of stuff. Will was like, “You should come out to LA and do sessions and meet everyone here at Hallwood.” I was like, “That sounds so awesome.” It has always been my dream to go to LA to do music, and it’s so crazy that I got on a plane just a few weeks later to do just that.

At that point, I had only been doing sessions for not even two or three months. I’d probably done less than five sessions in my entire life when I went to LA for the first time, and in the first session that I did, I wrote “Fool,” my debut single, with Shy Kid and Tor Miller, who Will introduced me to. The day we wrote that song, I was just like, “Wow, this is the kind of music I want to be making.”

I had written a song a month prior, which is actually going to be my next single, called “Jade,” and that song was also an incredible writing experience. The writing felt super honest to me, and the sound felt like me, but it didn’t feel like the pinnacle of what I wanted my sound as an artist to be. When I had that first session, I was like, “Wow, I get it now. This is why I do this.”

I left that trip in July with three or four songs that I was obsessed with. I had been hating my music for months and, at that point, maybe even a year. So I was buzzing when I left LA. Then Will became my manager, and he was on calls with me, talking to labels and whatnot.

I was teasing another song at that point that I’m now not releasing, but I was fully preparing to release that song. Then Will was like, “You should come out to LA in August again, so you can finish writing a project, and we can start planning this rollout.” I was like, “Okay, great.”

I came out to LA and did more sessions with Shy Kid and Tor. Jack, my producer Shy Kid, knows Josh Scent, my A&R, really well, and he was just showing him what he’d been working on. Josh was like, “Who is this Maya girl?” Jack was like, “She’s this new artist. She has no music out, fresh graduated NYU student, and it’s been super awesome working with her.” He was like, “I need to meet her. Have her come in the office.”

The next day, I went in the office, and we had a two-hour meeting with Giant. It was incredible. We just could not stop chatting, and I was so nervous and intimidated, because I walked in and it was 15 people that all work in music – people that have the jobs that I was applying to.

The meeting was just insane. We played them the music, and they loved it. Then we got a call later that day, or the next day, within the few days that they wanted to sign me. Then we got the offer later in the next few weeks, and I left that trip with a lawyer and a record deal.

I met Nate Albert, the president, a few days later and played him all my music. I had such a wonderful, humbling conversation with him, and it really sealed the deal for me that Giant was the place for me, and that everyone there just really cared about the music. The fact that they were investing in me at absolutely nothing meant so much to me. It was such a clear decision.

After that, I had to completely pivot everything I was working on for the last few months and be like, “Okay, well, now I’m signing a record deal, and I’m not releasing the song anymore because now I have all this new music that I love.” Once September hit, I just put my head down and wrote so much music. I was in the studio every other day, if not every day.

After I signed the deal in October, we were starting to gear up for this February release, and that’s how it all happened. I was supposed to release a song in June or July, and now a whole different song ended up coming out in January. “Fool” is the song, I would say, that really got me the record deal, because that was a song that everyone was just buzzing about. I was buzzing about it. I was obsessed with it.

Maya Engen: Totally. That’s why I love them so much, too, because I feel like they’re really not chasing a trend or a viral moment. They’re really investing in the sound and the artistry of the artist and the person or the group that is behind that sound, and I just really respected how they saw that in me with no data to back it.

It’s been so lovely getting to know everyone at Giant. They’re genuinely lovely and care, and just genuine people.

Maya Engen: Growing up, I was so obsessed with Miley Cyrus. She was always my biggest idol, obviously with Hannah Montana. I showed up to first grade, dress as your future career, literally as Hannah Montana. Her voice and the power behind her voice has inspired me so much.

I’ve always been the most inspired by big vocalists. Adele was also huge for me growing up. Amy Winehouse continues to be such a huge inspiration to me. Aretha, Etta James, Frank Sinatra – I grew up listening to a lot of Frank Sinatra – Prince, Duffy, Norah Jones, Al Green, all those really soulful artists that you can just hear the emotion behind their music.

What excites me the most about the music I’m making right now is that I’m trying everything. Because I’m so new and I haven’t truly harnessed what my sound is going to be as an artist, that does feel very daunting to me, especially as I’m starting to release music. I’m like, “What are the fans gonna like? What is gonna do well? What’s my niche?” But I also have to look at it from a more positive perspective, where I’m like, “It’s so exciting that I haven’t figured that out yet.”

I’m trying absolutely everything. I’m saying yes to everything. I’m taking influence from every corner of genre and artist that I can, and seeing how I can take inspiration from something and make it entirely my own.

Maya Engen: The song is about being in a toxic relationship, or friendship in my case, where you feel like you’re giving so much more than you’re getting. You keep taking care of someone and exhausting every last bit of energy and love you have for them when they’re just simply not reciprocating.

There comes a point, or at least in my case, where I just kept being disrespected, and I would give them another chance, and I would still be surprised every time the same outcome would happen, and I would be disrespected again. I started to lose my mind, because I loved this person so much, but there came a point where I was like, “What am I doing here?”

The song follows the narrative of all the times that I did have to care for that person, take care of them, and then get nothing in return. Not only get nothing in return, but only get disrespect in return.

The song is about really owning the vulnerability behind being really hurt from that situation, and being able to be like, “Wow, I was really hurt by this, and I’m angry and upset.” Specifically channeling that anger and that frustration into self-confidence, reclaiming your identity, learning what self-respect means for yourself, and taking the first step of walking away from something that doesn’t serve you anymore.

It’s about the specific feeling of being super hurt and upset, but also those two things can exist at the same time: being super upset about it, and also being like, “I’m going to walk away, and I deserve better for myself.”

Maya Engen: It has to be a mantra sometimes. When I was in that session, the song started being something entirely different. I wanted to write about a similar concept, about the same situation, but more just about how separated we had become. As I kept writing it, I was like, “No, I’m angry. I’m pissed off right now.”

The song became so much more angsty and bad bitch, and that is when I started to be like, “Yeah, this feels like me.” It’s ironic, because the next song I’m releasing is about love, and I’m in a super happy relationship right now, and I have been, but all my music is to capture the highest part of the emotion that you felt at that time. I think that the song really sonically and lyrically captures that.

Maya Engen: Totally. Absolutely. Writing in general, whether it’s songwriting or journaling, is a huge creative outlet for me and very therapeutic for me. I’ve actually found that in my past romantic relationships, I would notice that whenever I would write in my journal, complain about the way that I feel, or write a song about it, if I was still unsure about how I felt about the situation, as soon as I’d write it down, I’d be like, “Well, now I’ve held myself accountable. These words that are on this paper are tangible, and this is tangible proof that I cannot do this to myself anymore.”

It’s really hard to accept the fact that you’re not treating yourself the way that you should be. That was super difficult for me to accept, and I think that when I wrote that, it felt very vulnerable to accept that I wasn’t respecting myself.

When I wrote that song, I was reclaiming my independence. Writing it, and especially being able to sing it, helped me. Something that I value so much, especially as a vocalist first and foremost, is the way that I feel when I’m singing it, because I just love to sing.

I grew up singing covers, and that’s what made me fall in love with the emotion behind storytelling and lyricism. Being able to write the melodies in the specific way that they’re written was almost just as therapeutic as writing the lyrics themselves, because the melodies feel like that feeling in my head.

It definitely helped me work through it. After that, I was like, ‘I’m so past this now. I do not care, and now I have a banger because of it.’

Maya Engen: I’m trying not to say too much about the situation, but in that friendship, there were a lot of scenarios where I just constantly had to take care of that person in that specific way, more often than not. It just got so exhausting.

There was this one instance that that exact scenario happened. Well, multiple times, but that image has always just been, like, when that happened, yes, the story is true, that did happen. When that did happen, I remember in my mind being like, “There is no way that I am doing this right now.” As a 5’4 woman, I cannot believe I am doing this right now by myself, mind you.

That moment was really a wake-up call for me. I was like, “What the hell am I doing here?” It was really symbolic for how the rest of that relationship played out, and it was what made me realize that I really needed to just get myself together and walk away, even though it was so difficult. I just had to take that first step.

Maya Engen: Writing that chorus was such an effortless experience. It just happened, and then it was like, “Oh wow, I can’t believe we just made that.” The chorus, in my head, is the two sides when you’re in these toxic relationships. You typically have two sides of your mind: one that is super hurt and upset, being like, “How could this person that I love do this to me?” And the other voice in your head is like, “What the hell?” It’s angry, and like, “I need to walk away. Screw you. I deserve better.”

This chorus is the embodiment of those two voices fighting at each other in your head when you’re at that final hour of deciding what to do, when you know you need to walk away.

I’m a very vulnerable person. I really, truly do wear my heart on my sleeve, and I used to be convinced that it was actually a bad trait of mine, or not a bad trait necessarily, but something that shouldn’t be valued as much as it is.

I think it’s so important to see the vulnerable side of these feelings. These two feelings of standing up for yourself and being sad and hurt can exist at the same time. Specifically in that relationship, I was shamed so deeply for feeling deeply and being really vulnerable.

That chorus was a testament to, like, “You can’t make me feel bad about this anymore.” I can say that it’s not fair that you did this to me, and I’m hurt by it, but I can also say that I’m going to get my lick back, and you’re never going to do this to me again.

I think it’s really valuable to own something that’s hard to admit. Being able to declare that is just as powerful as saying that you’re moving past something. I don’t think you’re truly ever moving past something if you’re not really accepting the feelings and thoughts that are the hardest to admit.

Maya Engen: Tor’s the best. He was the first songwriter that I met out of New York, and Will is also his manager, so it was so awesome that Will put me in that room with him and Jack, because they’re homies as well.

I was so intimidated when I went in, because they’re both a little bit older than me. They’re both men, and I was so intimidated, especially because not only had I not worked with anyone like him before, I hadn’t worked with anyone before, period. I was so not used to sessions in rooms where I didn’t know anyone.

I didn’t know who Tor was before, and then I obviously looked into him before working with him, and I was just so immediately impressed by his credits and his music. I was so excited to work with him. He’s so cool. He’s such a cool guy. He’s also from New York, and on our first session, he came in wearing an “I Heart NY” shirt. One thing about me is “I Heart NY” is my thing. I literally wear an “I Heart NY” shirt at least once a week. It’s something that my friends all know is a huge part of my brand, which is literally why now my brand is going to be “I Heart Me,” because my initials are M.E.

When he came wearing that shirt, I was like, “Oh, he gets it! He gets it!” Working with him was so awesome. Like I said, I was super intimidated. He immediately made me feel so comfortable, and he was so easy to talk to. We didn’t have a lot of time to kiki and get to know each other the first session, and he was so sweet. We did a few sessions that week, and he asked me to get coffee the next day. We went and chatted for two hours, and it was so lovely.

Him and Jack have just been such mentors to me in that way. Working with him was so effortless, because I had never worked with a songwriter that had given me so much space to figure things out myself.

I had this impression that songwriters were supposed to be people that come in and, obviously not write the song for you, because I would never stand for that, but they would come in and be so much more like, “You need to do this and that.” When I left our first session, I was like, “Wow, I’m so happy with what we made.” Then I was thinking about working with Tor, and I was like, “Wow, I can’t even pinpoint exactly what he did, because it was just so seamless.”

After the second time I worked with him, I thought about it some more, and I was like, “Wow, he knew all of the right questions to ask and things to say to elicit the emotion that I was trying to reach.”

Working with him has really made me change the way I think about songwriting and think about how songwriting really is just trying to capture the feeling of an emotion in words. He just knew so perfectly when to take a step back and when to come in and help me. He’s truly set the standard for me with every other new songwriter I’ve worked with. I really respect him as an artist and as a human being. We have a lot of shared experiences, and it was just so lovely to work with him. I’ve missed working with him so much, so I’m really excited to get back in the studio with him.

Maya Engen: A lot of music, I can definitely guarantee. “Jade” is the second song I’m releasing, and I’m so excited about it. It was the first song that I wrote before I started doing sessions and went out to LA. It was such a perfect songwriting experience. It was me and my friend Spencer, who’s been my producer in New York and who’s also my guitarist, an incredibly talented guitarist.

It was our first session where we wrote just the two of us by ourselves. I typically have an idea or an emotion that I know, or some kind of influence from a song that I know I want to come into a session with. I think that day, I had literally no idea what I wanted to do, and Spencer’s so great because he is such a talented musician. Sometimes when I don’t know what I want to do, he’ll just be like, “Well, here’s this chord progression, or this riff I’ve been loving,” and one thing led to the next.

It was literally a session where he spun around in his producer chair, and I put my head down in my songwriting book, and less than an hour later, I put my head up, and I was like, “I’ve written the entire song.” And he was like, “I just made the whole track.” It was so perfect. That was also the first song where, in a session, I wrote all of the lyrics by myself. But it still felt like such a collaborative experience.

When I left that day, I was listening to the bounce, and I was just like, “Oh my God, I can’t believe I just wrote this song.”

It’s about love. I’ve been in a relationship for over two and a half years now, and it’s the first relationship I’ve ever been in where I’ve truly felt like I’m not in a rush. In past relationships, I’ve always felt like there’s a ticking clock, and you never know how long things are going to last, and so you kind of have to romanticize every moment of that relationship, because you really never know what’s going to come next.

This is the first time that I’ve never had that feeling, because I’m just like, “I have all the time in the world, and what a beautiful thing.” I really wanted to write a song that truly captured what my love for my girlfriend felt like.

Especially because she’s the first serious queer relationship I’ve been in, I was so excited to have a song that not only captured the feeling of love that I had, but specifically through a queer lens. It happened so effortlessly, and I’m just so proud of the songwriting. To this day, I think I’ve become such a better songwriter since I wrote that song, and to this day, I still think it’s some of, if not the best songwriting I’ve ever done.

It truly encapsulates my relationship and the love I have for my girlfriend. One of the lyrics in the chorus that I love so much is, “Oh, to keep you around / Oh, to love you out loud.” Anyone can relate to it, because it’s the feeling of finally being with the person of your dreams that you’ve always wanted to be with. It’s such a fulfilling feeling, knowing that you can scream it from the rooftops and tell anyone that you finally found that feeling everyone’s looking for.

Also from a queer lens, I’m like, how joyous is it that I actually can love this woman out loud and be so proud of that? I’m super excited about the song. I literally think it sonically embodies that euphoric feeling of love, when you’ve been with someone for a really long time and you know nothing’s going to change.

It’s definitely a super different direction from “Fool.” It’s super indie rock-inspired, Fleetwood Mac, a bit country, but it still has that same passion in the vocal that “Fool” has. All of these songs, no matter what they’re about, all share that same passionate ethos that the sound just feels like that emotion. So I’m very excited about it. There’s lots.

Maya Engen: I want listeners to feel like the most confident versions of themselves when they listen to “Fool,” and when they listen to my music in general. I am someone that romanticizes things so much. I love to see the beauty in every single experience and emotion, even if it’s a bad one.

I was also the kind of kid that always thought they were being recorded when they were younger, like I always thought I was in a movie or a TV show, so I would always envision myself having a soundtrack to my life. That’s also kind of what I want people to take away from my music. I want my music to feel like a soundtrack to the emotion that you’re feeling.

I want people to listen to “Fool” as if it’s their walkout song. Like, “Yes, I’m a bad bitch, and this is who I am, and I’m unafraid to be who I am.” I want them to take away passion and confidence and self-respect, and I hope it inspires someone to walk away from something that doesn’t serve them.

Maya Engen: It was the first song that truly made me feel like I was a step closer to discovering who I am as an artist, and so I will always have a special place in my heart for that song because of that, especially because of where it’s taken me with getting a record deal and everything.

I feel like I owe everything to this song, even if nothing ever comes of it and this is as far as I go. Making the song really solidified what the most confident version of myself looks like, and has given it a sonic identity, as well as an emotional one.

It’s challenged me to continue to stay really honest in my songwriting and not be afraid to write something that scares you a little bit, write about something that scares you, and admit something that you might not want to admit.

I always want to write songs that make my voice feel and sound as good as it does there. I feel like my voice shines in a way on that record that I always want to pay homage to.

Maya Engen: I just love Olivia Dean. I’ve been a fan of hers for so long, so I’m so happy she’s finally getting her flowers. She’s such an inspiration to me and the music that I’m making right now specifically, because I think she does such a good job of paying homage to those that came before her while also creating something that is entirely her own.

As a songwriter, it’s really easy to feel intimidated by other people’s songwriting that’s so elaborate and complex and poetic about such intricate things. I think she is someone that has really slowed me down and reminded me that you can write something entirely new and unique about such a simple feeling, because everyone shares these same experiences and universal feelings, but it’s your perspective that makes you unique and sets you apart from all the other millions of songs that are about love, or whatever topic you’re writing about.

She’s really inspired me to slow myself down and be honest with my writing. Someone else I’ve really been inspired by recently is Joy Crookes. I love her sound and her voice a lot. And RAYE, as well. I have been loving the rise of vocalists really being back, and I hope that I can follow suit in any kind of way. So I would say RAYE, Joy Crookes, and Olivia Dean.

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