{"id":6719,"date":"2025-11-05T18:01:03","date_gmt":"2025-11-05T19:01:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.unlockingsite.com\/?p=6719"},"modified":"2025-11-10T12:27:39","modified_gmt":"2025-11-10T12:27:39","slug":"true-blue-has-her-knives-out-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.unlockingsite.com\/index.php\/2025\/11\/05\/true-blue-has-her-knives-out-2\/","title":{"rendered":"True Blue Has Her 'Knives Out'"},"content":{"rendered":"

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“If you can’t take the heat\/ get out of the kitchen.”<\/p>\n

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That saying (or cliche) is usually meant to signify a brash and macho sense of consequence. But when cooed by artist True Blue<\/a> (Maya Laner) on her fittingly titled track “Knives Out,” the saying has a more tragic feeling: a feeling of inevitability or growth. The next line speaks to the uneasy reality of the music business: “Cause there are way too many people in here cooking,\u201d Laner sings.<\/p>\n

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“I was struggling at the time with whether or not I wanted to fully pursue a solo artist career and also feeling overwhelmed by the feeling of over saturation of new artists in the music space,” Laner tells PAPER<\/em>. Laner who has toured with the likes of Alex G, Porches and Caroline Polacheck has had a vibrant and busy life as an instrumentalist. But the realities of balancing both independent creative work and the grueling schedule of touring were a struggle to navigate.<\/p>\n

“I have really had to hone the skills of how to manage my time, protect my energy, and allow myself time and space to rest and digest in a world that is constantly demanding output,” she shares.<\/p>\n

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But with her recently released full length album, Star Witness<\/em>, the Copenhagen-based artist is leaning into the joy (and discomfort) of being a solo artist. “Sometimes it\u2019s hard for me to recognize the value in my own expression and I can be hard on myself about what I\u2019m really contributing to the world by dedicating my life to sharing my art,” she says. “[But] it feels really rewarding to be brave and to also surrender over this artifact that I\u2019ve been coveting. I worked really hard on developing the music and visual world in tandem to developing my own interiority for many years.”<\/p>\n

Part of the world is the video to “Knives Out,” which finds Laner and co. in a dreamy world of pearls, shells and general nautical ambiance.<\/p>\n

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“The concept of the video was inspired by making a love letter to treasure collecting. I have always been a treasure collector, sometimes literally keeping other people\u2019s trash as spirit talismans,” Laner tells PAPER<\/em>. “My great grandmother on my father\u2019s side was a Scottish ‘fisher girl.’ These fisher girls, also known as ‘herring lassies,’ were a nomadic workforce of women who traveled alongside herring fishing boats, processing the fish on shore. I had a fantasy of me and a team of fellow blondes working in a treasure sorting facility, where we process and harvest oceanic trinkets and treasures.”<\/p>\n

PAPER <\/em>chatted Laner about her creative world in Copenhagen, leaning into her solo career and the collaborative process behind the music video for “Knives Out.”<\/p>\n

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