Name: Vincent Littlehat
Occupation: Lyricist, songwriter, composer, videographer
Nationality: Polish
Current release: Vincent Littlehat's Another Land Below EP is out now via Littlehat Recordings.
Recommendations: Album: Friends That Break Your Heart by James Blake; Book: Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut

If you enjoyed this interview with Vincent Littlehat and would like to stay up to date with her music and activities, visit her on Instagram, twitter, and tiktok.



When did you start writing/producing/playing music and what or who were your early passions and influences? What was it about music and/or sound that drew you to it?

My creative journey started with writing lyrics about 7 years ago. Shortly afterwards, I connected with musicians in London where I lived at that time, and my writing took a vocalized / melodic form.

I love how music can encapsulate a short story which can give a perspective on our ones. The flow of music can bypass reasoning; it has the potential for a direct influence on our emotional recognition. It’s such a powerful tool.

My early influences were Syd Barrett, Cat Power and Rufus Wainwright. I’ve been listening to Polish musicians and lyricists as well; Katarzyna Nosowska, Swietliki, Maria Peszek among others. Skalpel and Oscar Peterson are my favourites when it comes to jazz.



When I listen to music, I see shapes, objects, and colors. What happens in your body when you're listening and how does it influence your approach to creativity?

Interesting. I don’t get such abstract visual impressions myself. It feels like I am getting internally massaged when listening to music with no lyrics; my state changes and I get internally synchronized with the flow that the song has.

I am activated by songs with clearly narrated stories. When something resonates it’s like an audiobook which I can very vividly imagine.

One of my favourites is 'Not Because It’s Easy, But Because It’s Hard', a song by Jens Lekman.



How would you describe your development as an artist in terms of interests and challenges, searching for a personal voice, as well as breakthroughs?

Searching for a personal voice requires patience, so it can be noticed. I was unsure which direction to take to find it until I recognized that the voice is already within. I just continue to learn the techniques to articulate it better and gain strength and clarity.

I am being challenged by every person I work with; they get to shape me in different directions, which helps to discern who I am as a singer and who I am not. These role-playing moments are good for me too, creating different kinds of strength that I can implement in my expression.

Recently I’m being drawn back to the roots, to the genre that is more popular in the Balkan countries, which is sung poetry. It’s an intersection of vocal and acting impressions. I’m impressed by how minimal and reach at the same time this field is.

Tell me a bit about your sense of identity and how it influences both your preferences as a listener and your creativity as an artist, please.

I moved out from Poland with a desire for my identity to be shaped more universally, by having impressions of the cultures of different countries and specific people who have grown in them. I’ve not been connected to a specific space or a person for too long as if I’ve been scanning the potential.

Hoping to be found at the end of this search is a place that would be satisfying and feel like home. It’s a question of the identity of a lone wanderer. Paradoxical freedom of having a choice to be anywhere, having a hard time to be local and involved, because the grass seems greener …

I met others who have the quiet but constant feeling of being misplaced. Not being able to grow roots, which we are connecting with ourselves through others. The fragmented fashion of constructing my identity in a space and with specific others is blown up by opposite potentials and side effects of social media.

There is a feeling of disintegration which, when recognized, inspires finding / establishing a community. Digital collectibles have this potential for artists but I am still struggling with missing the physical aspect that doesn’t exist (yet) in the digital spaces.

My preference as a listener is to receive musical recommendations from friends or people whose opinions I value. It comes to focusing on the creation, talking about it, and perhaps going to a concert one day. I try to listen to albums more than to playlists. I struggle with holding attention to one subject, so these strategies help me with staying exposed to one subject for a long while.

What, would you say, are the key ideas behind your approach to music and art?

The key is to say something through it that is of value, at least for me. Something that I’d like to remember, so it has to be repeated. I get to discover it while I am expressing myself.

I often don’t have a clear idea upfront, but an openness and curiosity for what will be born through the process.

How would you describe your views on topics like originality and innovation versus perfection and timelessness in music? Are you interested in the “music of the future” or “continuing a tradition”?

I believe that all these topics can be very well combined. I like to keep awareness of the spectrums and explore both sides.

Learning the traditional and universal whenever I get too relaxed in my expression and become not easy to comprehend.

Throughout your development, what have been your most important instruments and tools - and what are the most promising strategies for working with them?

For songwriting, I am using Ableton, and tools such as thesaurus or websites for finding rhymes have been helpful.

I don’t play an instrument yet, I’ve been recently practicing simple melodies on the harmonica. I am attracted by this instrument, it’s one that Snufkin from Moomins played. I liked this character as a kid.

Take us through a day in your life, from a possible morning routine through to your work, please.

It’s hard for me to establish routines, but I know how necessary these are. I try my best to have a regular sleeping schedule and go to bed at the same time every day. That’s of great importance to have a proper rest.

I’ll wake up around 9 after 8 or 9h of sleep. It’s not every day but I’ll either go for a yoga class or have a walk. Afterward, I either will work from a co-working space that my friends run. I’ll have porridge and then work on my office tasks. I might go to a singing class and then continue my practice at home.

In the evening meeting a friend, or going to a concert or a movie would be the most recurring themes. My routine is that I travel very often, to visit my family or friends, for jobs. That makes it harder to hold to a daily pattern.

Could you describe your creative process on the basis of a piece, live performance, or album that's particularly dear to you, please?

My process starts always with lyrics; they are usually not completed and lack the chorus. I’ll quickly write a drum pattern, chords, and melodies in Ableton to make space for a melodic interpretation of my lines. On my own, I create demo versions, less developed or more.

The biggest creative fun is for me to collaborate, with a musician or a producer. I love working with people. Kris Steininger with whom I work on half of the songs from Another Land Below EP always challenges me to write more and come to record vocals better prepared.

I like to grow towards this kind of healthy expectation.

Listening can be both a solitary and a communal activity. Likewise, creating music can be private or collaborative. Can you talk about your preferences in this regard and how these constellations influence creative results?

As mentioned above, I prefer to start on my own and express more vulnerable hidden truths when nobody is checking on me.

Then once I am more confident, when the sprout has potential, I prefer that it gets nurtured in collaborative mode.

How do your work and your creativity relate to the world and what is the role of music in society?

I’ve been answering this question for myself for a while.

I thought at first that what I say has to be taken very responsibly and that the lyrics have to have the highest nutritional value. Now I see it more as just a huge variety of foods and cuisines. There are different kinds and a healthy spectrum is not of the only importance. Sometimes a less perfect ingredient is fun to intake if it’s not abused of course.

All arts can be used as a tool of various propaganda, and marketing that doesn’t benefit the consumer. The deliberate, systematic attempt to shape perceptions. The answer to it is counterpropaganda messages in lyrics, for example, these healing, and resisting toxic positivity.

Creating the process of making and performing music is a great tool for self-reflection. I find it as therapeutic as journaling. Music can bring people together, as chanting for example. It can divide people if we only consume separately via headphones, but sometimes that’s needed if someone needs their private space and time alone.

I guess music has many roles, which could be judged as good and bad. Being mindful of all is best, to get different impacts and learn from them.

Art can be a way of dealing with the big topics in life: Life, loss, death, love, pain, and many more. In which way and on which occasions have music – both your own or that of others - contributed to your understanding of these questions?

Interestingly, I will often come across a song that I needed to hear to understand something at the right time, or soothe myself knowing that someone has been through the same.

In the time of creating, I get to explore mentioned by you topics and conclusions will surface.

How do you see the connection between music and science and what can these two fields reveal about each other?  

I know about a link between art and brain science. Creating makes us joyful, and the chemistry of the brain changes to a more vital one.

I’d like to get the tool of songwriting accessible to more people; those who doubt themselves as less talented, for example. It’s just such a good exercise to dig into less conscious layers of the psyche. It gets softened somehow by the creative fertilizers our brain releases when we are playful.

Creativity can reach many different corners of our lives. Do you feel as though writing or performing a piece of music is inherently different from something like making a great cup of coffee? What do you express through music that you couldn't or wouldn't in more 'mundane' tasks?

Making a great cup of coffee can be seen as a creative challenge too if one attends it with attention and curiosity. As music, it is something that can be shared. The way the cup is handed, the quality attention we give to the person who will drink it, ourselves included.

The difference between a musical piece and a cup of coffee is that it has more dimensions and variables in which it can be expressed and received. The whole body can be engaged, moved, and inspired.