SPRINGFIELD — Much of singer-songwriter Molly Bogin’s life so far can be considered a cycle.
She was born and raised in Springfield’s Forest Park neighborhood where creativity was fostered in her family’s home from a young age. Both of Bogin’s parents performed in community theater productions at Trinity United Methodist Church and the Springfield Jewish Community Center and as she grew older, Bogin followed in her parents’ footsteps. She began piano lessons at Trinity Church and performed regularly at Sunday church service and at the annual Boar’s Head Festival, but it wasn’t until she started school that she was introduced to classic jazz and gospel, the sounds which inspire her today.
“My dad loved Motown and music that was influenced by gospel, but it wasn’t like that was the main source of music in our household,” Bogin said in an interview with The Republican. “And so much of the music that I make now is influenced by gospel.”
Bogin attended Springfield schools, starting with the Zanetti School, followed by the Renaissance School and then Springfield Central High School, where she graduated in 2014. She had no shortage of opportunities growing up in the city, explaining that she was “all over the art scene of Springfield as a kid.”
“I had a lot of amazing musical influences from the time I was very young, and all of that has come together in a really lovely way,” Bogin said. “All of the learnings from the different genres I was exposed to by all the different people in my life have made a huge impact on the sound of my music.”
After graduating from high school, a journey took her to Wellesley College where she studied neuroscience with the original plan in mind to then attend medical school. Instead, after graduation, she moved to New York to pursue her music and, after bouncing back and forth between New York and Los Angeles for a few years, made the decision to return to the Springfield area to begin studying for her Master of Social Work at Smith College.
And, at the same time as she flies into Bradley International Airport, Bogin will be celebrating her first official full-length music release.
The cycle of her life is not what inspired her first EP, “Attachment Cycle,” a seven-song project with a mix of soul, jazz and gospel inspirations. The EP, due out on May 29, is a collection of pieces that were largely influenced by her own life and her relationship — both personal and professional — with her boyfriend and producer Will Saulsky. The two worked on opposite sides of the country on one song, “Let Me Go,” a slow, lo-fi track, and finally, came back in studio together on the final song of the EP, the celebratory, upbeat “Dancing in the Rain.”
As she prepares to balance her studies with her music endeavors, Bogin took time to chat with The Republican about “Attachment Cycle” and the inspiration behind it all. The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Q. What was the writing process like for “Attachment Cycle”?
A. I didn’t consider myself to be a songwriter when I was growing up. I mean, I definitely did write songs, but none of them were very good. Going back and looking at them, I’m like, “this is so silly.” The melodies are good, but the words mean nothing, and they were all deep, emo teenager writing. And I think it really was at the beginning of college and then after college that I got more into songwriting, rather than just being a singer who would occasionally try and write a song, [and that’s] because I was surrounded by people who were incredible songwriters. I was so inspired and influenced and I wanted to work harder to learn how to be a better storyteller when it came to music. I have another songwriter in my family. I have a songwriter in my partner. The people I’m surrounded by are inspiring me every day to keep growing as a songwriter.
Q. And how would you describe the story in “Attachment Cycle’?
A. “Attachment Cycle” has a story, and I feel like that story is, in part, something that was mirrored back after finishing the songs. Some artists write an album with a clear sense of “this is the story that I’m telling,” so it’s almost like writing a musical or a play that is meant to give you a very specific sense of this happens and then this happens. I love those albums, [but] this is definitely not how I went about writing this album (laughs.) This was an album that came together because I was like, “these are my favorite songs that I’ve written so far,” or they all felt like they worked together.
Q. Were parts of “Attachment Cycle” inspired by your own life?
A. The first song from this project that I wrote was “Bad Party Guest,” and that was a silly, spur of the moment song where I went to a party and ran into someone that I had gone to college with. And when we were in college together, he barely acknowledged me. And then at this party, he really gave me the time of day. And we had this long conversation, and I said something super embarrassingly off color, where I was talking about something in college that I hadn’t really liked for one reason or another. And it turns out that he was involved in it. And after I realized I had said it, I was like, “oh, no,” immediate foot in my mouth kind of moment. And after I got home, I was like, “I wonder if I can write a song about how I didn’t mean to insult this guy at the party.”
Q. So the process for you was definitely different from traditional storytelling.
A. Yeah, I think everybody’s process looks a little bit different, and mine has definitely shifted depending on what I’m writing about. So “3am” is fictional, but then “When the Neon Fades” and “I Want You to Be Sad” are both very much based on a breakup, and so those were songs where I was really sitting in the lyrics more because I wanted it to accurately represent what I was feeling.
[All the songs] had a vaguely similar theme of love, loss and independence. And so, I was like, “I think these can work together, I think I can finish all of these songs.” And if I thought about how to position them relative to each other, there was a story there. There is a story there that in some ways is depicting a relationship — or relationships — that I have had myself, which is the process and up-and-down of a situationship or open relationship, where there’s a lot of ebb-and-flow. I think it’s something that a lot of people have experienced, and it felt like an accurate representation of the story that the songs are.
Q. And the final song on the EP, “Dancing in the Rain,” really sounds like a celebratory one to end the album off with. Can you talk about that?
A. “Dancing in the Rain” is a co-write that I did with my boyfriend [Will Saulsky], who is also my producer. “Dancing in the Rain” feels the most like a song that is about living in your own imagination and feeling a sort of freedom in your own mind. In the context of the large project, I feel like it is a cycle, a circle, but somewhere in that cycle you have at least a moment, if not something longer, of finally feeling a sense of freedom within yourself and just letting go. I feel like ending on that note makes the most sense because you want to feel that way in the end. You want to feel like, if this is going to end, you’re ending on a note that is,“I feel independent, I feel free, I feel creative and inspired.’”
Q. What was it like, co-writing with your producer and boyfriend?
A. That question ends up being multifaceted because he is a triple threat in the context of like, he is producer, co-writer on a certain song, and then also partner. And those are three very distinct roles. The process was great, and it took us a little bit to get to. When I talk to new people or when we meet people together, one of the questions that we often get is “oh, did you meet through music?” And the answer is no. We met on Hinge. (laughs) And I knew Will was a musician, so once we started dating and had been together for a little bit, I was nervous to show him any of the music that I was making because I was like, “you’re really good at what you do.” It took five or six months for me to show him the music that I was working on, and then we very quickly started jamming together or occasionally trying to write things together.
And then, I think co-writing is different even than producing. Like in any relationship, musical relationships are based on trust and transparency, and there’s both the trust of “I need you to listen to this idea and hear me and trust that what I’m saying is what I need” and also trust that if the other person is making decisions, that they are also doing it with the song in mind. You’re both trying to make the song the best it can possibly be, and you might be coming at it from different angles, but you want to trust that both people are trying to make a beautiful final product. And I think that “Dancing in the Rain” is a really good example of that.
“Let Me Go,” which is also on this album, is a song that we technically co-wrote, but we did so separately. So he had already produced the track and I toplined it. I asked him if he would send me tracks that he had because I like trying to write new songs, and he sent it to me and I wrote something to it and I was like “oh, I really like this, now I’m excited about it.” Whereas with “Dancing in the Rain,” we were sitting in his studio and we were like, “let’s make something new,” and while Will was working on producing the track, I started coming up with lyrics.
Q. Was it harder to work on “Let Me Go,” since you two were physically separate?
A. It was certainly different, “Let Me Go” we did from across the country. I have lived between Brooklyn and L.A. for the last few years, and we did “Let Me Go” while I was in New York. A lot of this album I wrote while I was in New York, and then I came back and we worked on it together when I was living in L.A.
I think the process of writing “‘Let Me Go” was much more individual. He had already produced out this track and I wrote out a whole song. I wasn’t like, “do you think these lyrics are good?” along the way, or “do you like this melody?” I was just like I’m going to write what I like and then I’ll send it back and see what he thinks. Whereas “Dancing in the Rain” was much more like working on a group project together as opposed to one or two people doing separate parts of the project. I love “Let Me Go,” but in my mind, it will always have a certain amount of “OK, we did two things separately and brough them together, and now they sound good,” versus ‘Dancing in the Rain,’ which was a more holistic project.
Q. Did you design the album cover for “Attachment Cycle,” too?
A. Yes, I did! I was deciding for a while between making something collage-oriented or using a photo of myself. But ultimately, I was falling asleep one night and I kept thinking about what “cycle” means to me. Clock imagery kept coming to me, but I didn’t want to use a clock. I just wanted to use something that felt like it was a bike wheel with spokes, and I had the idea for a broken circle. The concept that everything along the way feels a little bit different, looks a little bit different, but you’re still a part of the same cycle — and it meant that I got to make a collage with some really cool magazine pages.
Q. You have this album coming out and you’re also coming back to Western Mass for school, right?
A. I’m starting my Master of Social Work program. So again, things are full circle in a sort of different sense, because I’m back in the neuroscience psychology part of my brain as I move into a next career path, which I’m really excited about, and a little bit nervous.
Q. Since you’re coming back, is there any hope of a Molly Bogin concert in the future?
A. I am very hopeful. I am submitting to a couple of different music venues in the Western Mass region, so hopefully this summer I will have some dates.
To stay up to date on Molly Bogin’s music, follow her on Instagram @mollyrosebogin. There, she has links to stream her music and to order “Attachment Cycle.”
