It’s taken over a decade for Wilby’s Maria Crawford to distil a lifetime’s worth of experience intoher remarkably sharp debut album, Center of Affection. On “Spin”, one of the earliest introductions to the LP, Crawford intones, “I only like it when it’s hard.” It’s a defining moment not limited to just the melancholic ‘90s-inflected indie-rock number, but to the record’s anchoring themes rooted in unfiltered self-reflection. The now Brooklyn-based songwriter’s process was founded on a practice of writing morning pages with Crawford’s pen excavating emotional artefacts of her past, chipping away to her childhood. Crawford’s greatest skill across Center of Attention is the universality in which she articulates the frustrations and sadness felt while reliving some of the experiences, in her interior life and the relationships in her life, across this extremely human body of work.

Over Zoom, ahead of the release of Wilby’s eagerly anticipated debut record, Center of Affection, out Friday, October 10th via Hit The North Records (Double Wish, Joyer) Crawford spoke to Northern Transmissions on the different roles of an artist and songwriter, finding freedom in writing this record and learning to love bridges.

NT: Your debut record, Center of Affection, is coming out on Friday. How are you feeling about it coming out?

Wilby: I’m really excited. It’s been a fast but long process. The making of it all went by really quickly. I’ve just been trying to have space this week to reflect because it’s often hard for me to process things in real time. We made [Center of Affection] almost two years ago and it’s just crazy that the time is finally here. It’s a weird process being an artist because you have this big body of work that you’ve been pouring so much time into that nobody else has heard, and it’ll be new for them. I’m excited to give the record its new life, with it being officially out

NT: I was reading about your writing process and how the songs came from your practice of writing morning pages. As you mentioned, it’s been almost 2 years since you recorded the record, and you’ve had different experiences since then and have probably changed in some ways as a person and artist. How has it been to revisit the songs and see the version of yourself from that time compared to where you are today?

Wilby: Honestly, it makes me emotional because I was a really brave version of myself writing these songs. I was way more in myself and in my being. I’m always trying to chase that now. I was shedding a lot of things at the time when I was writing the album. I’m so proud of the version of myself that wrote those songs, and I’m now in the process of living it out. A lot of these songs are all very personal, very diaristic. Now, I’m trying not to back down from what I wrote about on this album, a lot of my personal life and conversations. When you write a song about an ex, there’s a moment where you wonder whether you should tell them or not tell them that a song’s going out about them! A lot of these songs are about my family or about my childhood.

Making the record has been really liberating, but then also, it’s forced me to have conversations. There’s no turning back at this point! It’s scary but really freeing and liberating. I’m really proud of these songs, and I’m really proud of the version of me that wrote them. I’m excited to rip the band-aid off officially on Friday.

NT: Do you remember what the first line was from your morning pages that kick-started the writing of the album? With that honesty and vulnerability in your writing from that time, I’d love to hear about how the discomfort and uncertainty while developing the lyrics have helped in the evolution of your writing and what you’re working on at the moment.

Wilby: When I was writing this record, I got a lot of power in telling my story. That’s the only thing that’s unique about me, and that’s not me being self-deprecating. I have a lot of confidence in this album. I’m not trying to reinvent the wheel and there’s gonna be a lot of things sonically, melodically or lyrically that have been said before, especially right now with there being so much music coming out, that I found so much power for myself in writing things and speaking things out through these songs that I was holding on to and not allowing myself to believe true. There was a lot of self-validation that I needed to give myself. That’s a lot of what this record is about, and that’s really scary.

We’ve been playing some of these songs for a while live, and the more and more I play them, it’s like a vulnerability hangover that I have because I’ve never been so blunt and honest before. It’s truly given me so much power, and I think as an artist, all I can do is speak from what I know. A lot of what I’ve been saying around this record is that, as an artist or as a songwriter, it’s important that what I’m writing is personal and my story. As an artist, I think bridging out to connect to other people and showing that universality is imperative, as well. I’ve been doing the artist thing for over 10 years, and playing music most of my life and writing songs since I was in middle school, but I’ve gone back and forth between both of those sides of songwriter-artist and doing it for me versus trying to just latch on to what’s popular or what people are gravitating towards. This is the first project that I feel like I’m writing for me, but I also have an inherent belief and confidence that we’re all connected, and my unique story is going to overlap with someone else’s, and that’s really healing to me and has given me a lot of momentum.

Then, the oldest song on the record is actually “Peripheral Vision”. I wrote that probably four years ago, and I tucked it away. All of the songs were pretty much written within the same time period between 2022 and 2023. When I wrote “Care”, I was like, ‘Oh, I want to write more songs from this space,’ because it was very cathartic and very honest. I felt very in my body when I wrote it. That’s how a lot of us, I think, find songwriting to begin with. We’re processing in real time, and so it was a lot of that. I had no filter with writing “Care”. That came from a very authentic space, and I wanted to continue that. That was definitely the tipping point for all of the other songs on the record.

NT: That’s so interesting. You mentioned the unfiltered nature of how you wrote about various experiences, going back to your childhood. I have to imagine that’s an incredibly intense and emotionally charged process. After you finished writing and recording the album, did you find that you had to take a break from picking away at yourself?

Wilby: Yeah, for sure! I’m very grateful that my constant collaborators, who I play live with and who I made the record with, my guitarist Aaron Hicks, my bassist Simeon Church and my drummer Zach Bodman, are the most comforting and sweetest men. They hold me up so graciously through all of the ups and downs of writing this record and making this record. I have to keep reminding myself that I need to give myself so much grace in the release of this record, especially because making music, recording and releasing music, it’s this creation like a child! It’s hard not to get discouraged about how things are received, and there are definitely moments in the release process where I’ve seen earlier stuff of Wilby that have more notoriety, which kind of hits me in my gut because this album is so much more like me and so much better, in my opinion. My vantage point is so much wider and so much more true. I just need to remind myself that my voice, and this record, came from a place of pure care and protection and nurturing my inner child. I need to remember that that’s what’s most important; that I did this and I was able to say things that I’ve said. I’m finding myself moving forward and writing whatever comes next, in a protective space, as well, and choosing what I share and what I don’t share. A lot of artists go through that on their second or third albums, where it’s like ‘Okay, I’ve spilt my guts out, how do I hold on to some things a little bit more tightly?’ I’m navigating that because there’s just so much power in sharing the ugly truths of things, but then also protection and security and safety are really important, as well. I’m navigating that while writing some new stuff.

NT: I’m glad you mentioned the word protection because that’s one of the song titles on Center of Affection and one that I always enjoyed spending time with. The album has so many different sonic sensibilities across the songs. “Protection” has such a great indie-rock drive to it, and then the latter half of the album hears you exist in more intimate spaces. I loved how those two different worlds sit alongside each other so effectively. Can you tell me about the process of creating the sonic worlds within the album and some of the reference points you had?

Wilby: The driving note, sonically, was capturing the live sound of Wilby. Most of the songs we recorded live with the band, and I was in a separate room doing rhythm and vocals. Then we would dub over my vocals as needed. There are a few tracks that we kept my original vocal for. The driving factor was wanting to sound like a live record, but having it polished as much as preserving the raw, live sound, while also making it really clean and polished.

Production is an arrow to your fanbase and listeners. It can cut you off from some listeners, and it opens you up to anyone. I wasn’t necessarily concerned with that, but I do think production plays a huge role in making an album. In that way, the live sound was really important to me. There’s something really magical about playing with my band. The energy I feel when I play with them live, I really wanted to capture that. I went into the studio wanting to preserve that vocal that I was tracking along with them because I knew that that vocal was going to be the best, in my opinion, as far as energy and emotion. For most of the tracks, we kept my original vocals.

The music we were listening to was a lot of throwback stuff. Me and the guys really love Death Cab for Cutie. With “Experiments”, I was listening to the Madi Diaz record that came out at the time we were in the studio, History of a Feeling, or maybe it was the one before that, but I love Madi’s songwriting and I wanted the feeling that her music gives me, I wanted to incorporate that into “Experiments”. We were working up the arrangement for that one and there was a math-rock version we created that was super weird and I was like, ‘This is not what the song is saying!’ I went home and remembered a Switchfoot song called “You”. The next day, we were going back to work on arrangements and I played that song for the guys, for “Experiments”, and I was like, ‘This is the energy it needs,” because I wanted it to be freeform and have a less is more feel. That’s how I ended up with that arrangement.

For the more intimate, acoustic songs like “Peripheral Vision” and “Hard To Be Loved”, it was really organic. For “Peripheral Vision”, we played it live, and my partner was in the mixing room playing synth while I was tracking the keys and vocals for that, and it was really sweet. We did two takes and I think the first take is what we kept. Same for “Hard To Be Loved”, it was its own thing. All that song needed to be was guitar and vocal. We referenced a Julia Jacklin track for that one.

There was a lot in the writing of the album and then recording them that previously I tried to hide my voice a bit because a lot of the indie music I was listening to, they didn’t really have a strong vocal presence whether on purpose or not. That was a guiding light on what I was doing vocally with my songs. With these songs, however, I really wanted to lean into the positives of what I have with my voice. I wanted to lean in to what my voice is and not shy back from that. I’m really happy about that and empowered about that. The songs wouldn’t be where they are if I chose a lower key and tried to shy away from having bigger vocal moments.

NT: What song or lyric do you feel captures the crux of Center of Affection and what it means to you?

Wilby: It’s probably a tie between “Care” and “Center of Affection”. They’re two sides of the same coin. For the first time ever I started writing bridges, which before this record, I could not write a bridge! It just always felt cheesy or not what the song was needing. With each song on this record, I was like, ‘What would happen if there was a bridge to a song? What would the bridge be?’ “Care” and “Center of Affection”, both of their bridges are the two thesis statements of the record. “Care’s” is like, ‘I don’t want to be someone afraid to make an apology of telling you what you mean to me’. That chokes me up every time because I remember creating that bridge and really losing it emotionally. I just think it’s really important to say that. Then, “Center of Affection” is more, from start to finish, it starts talking about a memory I had as a kid, my first thoughts of suicide ideation and parental affection into the second verse is more about relationships I have now where I’m wanting to find some kind of commonality with people that I love when we might differ on something politically or religiously. The bridge there is, ‘All I want is tenderness spilling out over everything / put it in my pocket act like I never lost it,’ That’s also really empowering to sing and say because most people in my life who knew me personally, until I started doing this therapy work that launched the album thematically and what I was writing, I was pretty dysregulated. People would say that I had a big heart, but I think on a day-to-day level I was pretty closed off to letting people see the real me emotionally. Now, I feel so in touch with tenderness and myself. That’s what I want, and that’s what I’m going to keep chasing. Especially in the U.S. with all of the everyday nonsense and just how grim it is. I think it’s really important to choose to resist apathy. That’s what I’m trying to do personally and as an artist in today’s climate.

NT: Amazing. Finally, what are some things that are the center of your affection at the moment?

Wilby: My dog! She’s a Viszla, her name is Mona. She’s precious, she’s also crazy, but I love her so much. It’s hilarious because she’s so much like me, that might be a selfish, self-absorbed thing to say, but from the moment we got her, she’s so like me. She’s also the purest joy thing in my life. I moved to Brooklyn a few months ago, and she’s like the mayor of our block. So yeah, I would have to say my dog and my partner. I’ve never been a romantic, but I think through this album, I’m trying, like the last song on the record, “Hard To Be Loved”, I wasn’t trying to write another song. I wrote that very quickly, right before I went into the studio. I think I’m just in a season of trying to receive the love and affection of people around me and acknowledge it, and not close myself off from it. I’m not sure what kind of answer I’m giving you, but I’m trying to be more gentle. I’ve been going to this psychic a few times, and she told me about the divine feminine and the divine masculine, and I’ve notably been very divine masculine. I’m a Leo, so I’m strong-headed and take charge. I’ve been challenged to lean into my divine feminine. That’s where I’m at right now: receiving love and not shying away from it and not being scared about it.

Pre-order Center of Attention by Wilby HERE