Mia Day

For an entire year, Seattle born indie-rocker Mia Day woke up out of breath. Her father had left her mother, and her partner — the guitarist in her band at the time — soon followed suit. Unmoored and unglued, she made her way through each day doing the only thing that had ever made sense to her: writing music. Those songs, forged during what could only be described as a hell year, comprise the musician’s most vital release yet, Hellier, Forever (out May 17th), which takes its title from a supernatural docuseries Day and her partner used to watch about a spooky Kentucky town — and the fact that if you say its name fast enough, it sounds like 365 days of torture. “I made this album as a way to survive,” she says.

On “Severed” (the lead single off Hellier), Day returns to her roots: the grungy, raw music that she listened to in the car with her Aunt, driving around the streets of Seattle.“That song felt like a breakthrough for me,” she says. Angsty and super loud, “Severed” is the sound of Day finally pulling herself free from the morass, ending, quite appropriately, with a guttural scream. When recording the song, Day mused that she didn’t remember the last time she’d channeled her frustration, her pain, her loss into something so visceral. One thing was for sure, though — it felt great.
- Brenna Ehrlich