Finding Happiness
DP: So at 19 you started singing and shortly after that you made your first single “Cooler Than Me” and that landed you a record deal. At this point you had a top 10 song, a debut album out and you were the “new” popular artist in music. But that didn’t make you happy. Why?
Mike Posner: I was looking in the wrong direction. Happiness cannot be found outside of one’s self, only within. I realized this because I was actually pretty damn good at attaining material things. At 22, I had seven figures in my bank account, a closet full of Air Jordans, and women seemed to really like me. But at some point I realized that no matter what level of fame I attained or how much money I accrued, I still had all of the same flaws that I had before.
Maybe you, yes YOU who are reading this right now…maybe you are looking in the wrong direction as well and you’re reading these words right now for a reason…or maybe not. Who am I to say?
DP: Did the pressures of making a hit like “Cooler Than Me” weigh heavily on you and your career? It sounds like RCA wasn’t willing to release your sophomore album without that “next big hit”.
Mike Posner: Success can be the enemy of growth. Everything was going “well” by society’s standards. I was traveling around the world, making money, and taking my shirt off at concerts. Thus, I was afraid to change anything about myself because maybe that could mean the end of everything going “well.” I was so scared of losing my “going wellness.” So it was a pressure that I put on myself, pressure to maintain, pressure to uphold, that manifested itself in all sorts of ways, including my music.
DP: You sing in your new song “I Took a Pill in Ibiza,” “I’m just a singer who already blew his shot”. Do you really feel that way at this point? Is it fair to say this album is for you?
Mike Posner: It’s ironic because in writing that line and other lines like it, I’m sort of getting another shot. It is more than fair to say this album is for me. But that’s how all art should be. I write the things that I like, that I want to exist in the world. I can’t write what you want to exist in the world, because I’ll never really know you.
“The poet must not avert his eyes.” I think Werner Herzog said that. That means the poet must look at everything, the beautiful, the pristine, but also the ghastly and the unspeakable.
Hit songs are like candy bars. They taste amazing, but a part of you will never feel truly full from candy bars. I made candy bars for years and I’m damn good at it. Now I would like to serve you a huge bloody piece of meat. Enjoy.
DP: Are you interested in writing the “candy bar” for other artists or is that part of your career over?
Mike Posner: For the most part I am not doing any outside sessions right now. But I make exceptions for artists that I find exceptionally inspiring. There is an art to the candy bar song as well.
