Interview: Hold It Against Me With Lola Kinsey

Interview by Lindsey V. Britt

From her hometown of Wylie, TX to performing at SXSW, Lola Kinsey is on the road to becoming a unique voice in her generation, bringing back the sound of classic rock with a pop twist. Drawing inspiration from personal experiences, she is sharing the challenges about coming of age.

What’s the story behind your new song “Hold It Against Me”?

My song “Hold It Against Me” came out a few days ago. It was kind of weird the making of this song, my boyfriend and I were kind of having a fight. We were just arguing and my Mom was like “Oh get a room,” and I was like what? Like, I’m over here upset, my boyfriend and I are in a fight, no. Eventually a few days later I was like you know what, I’m just going to make a song out of it. I made this song with two different perspectives. You can either take it like you always hold it against me, it’s always my fault, or you can take it as a romantically way. It was really fun creating, my Mom and I created it together, and she helped co-write the song.

How did you get started in music?

I’ve been doing music for a long time now, I’d say professionally I got started around freshman year of high school. I was in this one play, I had no idea what I was doing. But I just auditioned cause it was a musical and I would get to be able to sing in it. I got the part. None of my family knew at all that I could sing. I’ve sung my whole life, but this moment was the moment that everyone saw I could actually do it. So when I got on stage my family was like “Wow, she can actually sing.” Afterwards, I started pursuing it that year, I started doing it a little more professionally. I wouldn't say I had any professional vocal lessons. I kind of learned everything on my own as much as I could. I've just been trying to make music and trying to make it relatable to everyone.

I read that you have a debut album titled Come of Age being released later this year, how is it going?

It’s going pretty good. I'm 19 years old, so I'm growing, like growing out of the usual daily life I had before in high school. Now that I'm not in high school, I'm taking two years off to focus completely on music. There's so much more that came along the road than I would have thought; Responsibilities, maturity, knowing what to do and, it’s just a new journey of emotions as well. Because it's like, I’m wanting to do music so it's like, can I do this? Can I commit to this? So, it's been a long journey. The debut album is about coming of age, so it's definitely got a lot to do with that. And I think a lot of people can relate to that as well. I have a song coming out soon called “Your Parents Don't Like Me.” It's a goofy, dramatic song, along with my boyfriend, who's definitely the muse right now as well, to the album. It's really about coming of age and just realizing that there's a lot more responsibilities as you go along the road.

Who are some of your musical influences?

Oh my gosh, I have so many. I'd say right now is Stevie Nicks, Pat Benatar, and Linda Ronstadt.  I love all their different genres. Linda Ronstadt has like a million different genres, she dipped into Spanish music, classic rock, country, she’s just all over the place. That’s kind of my music because I have a lot of classic rock in my personal genre that I love to sing in. So I'm hoping to do classic rock with a mix of pop music. I'm trying to bring back a little bit of Linda Ronstadt mix with Pat Benatar.  If you want a more modern example, I'd say probably someone like Suki Waterhouse and Florence + The Machine, those types of people. I'd like to kind of connect with the older soul music, so that's what I'm trying to bring back to life. But, I definitely say my musical influences are Stevie Nicks, Linda Ronstadt, and Pat Benatar because of the stories they give out, and the different ways you can also perceive their song. For example, like “Hold It Against Me”, and some songs of theirs that you can just take it however you want to take it.

There’s a lot of tours going on in the Dallas area this year, is there an artist you would like to open for?

I would love to go on tour with like Suki Waterhouse or Chappell Roan. I'm very old souled, because a lot of the songs that I usually listen to, those singers don't really perform as much anymore.

I noticed that you have Flying Nun & That Girl on your Instagram bio, are you a fan of 60’s and 70’s television?

Yes, 100% yes. My Dad was the one that brought the term up and I was like what is that, I thought it was so funny and you know, some people would be able to, connect to that, so I wrote it down.

What’s your favorite television series from the 60’s/70’s era?

I like a whole bunch of shows, there's way too many to even pick, I guess The Carol Burnett Show or Cher.

Are you excited to be performing at SXSW this year?

Yes! My Mom is helping me get more gigs to get out there, so this one’s a festival, first one ever that I’ll be attending and performing, I’m super excited about it. I’ve got two songs out, the third one will be out soon enough, because I definitely want to be singing my originals. Also, gaining more fans, and people who listen to my music and relate to it.

Texas is known for barbecue, what is your favorite barbecue, or another kind of cuisine?

I’d say my favorite food would probably be Mexican food.  I haven't had barbecue in forever, but barbecue sounds amazing. But, yeah, I think my favorite is definitely Mexican food. And my favorite place to eat is Frankie’s.

Do you have any hobbies outside of music?

I do like to roller skate a lot, which is something I don't really talk about, but I love to roller skate. I used to go every single Saturday. And I just recently stopped because I wanted to focus more on music, I just loved the whole environment. I love being able to skate around in circles, even though it's kind of goofy, and just listen to music and be able to, like, dance and be happy around people who also enjoy music. And just the vibe of the skating rink.  I also like to write music. I wouldn't say I'm the greatest. I kind of just vomit out a whole bunch of words, and then that's how I start creating the song. My Mom helps me as well, cause I guess she has better grammar than I do, haha. So she helps me put the songs together to where they make a lot more sense than what I would put out.

If you could collaborate with anyone dead or alive, who would it be?

This is a good question. Maybe I would do Prince or Michael Jackson. I love them, I love they were just so iconic and, different from everyone else. I love them so much, so I'd probably do one of those two.

Do you have a recommendation? this can be anything you can imagine.

Movie wise, I would recommend, Daisy Jones & The Six.  It's more of like an episode series. I absolutely love it along with the whole favoriting Stevie Nicks. It's about, like Fleetwood Mac, and so I think it'll be a really good introducer, to just the music industry. Also, my advice is just to take your time, do whatever genre you want, like be your own genre. Don't feel like you need to be Sabrina Carpenter, cause yeah, she's super popular, she's so great, but you wanna be yourself. You wanna bring out that inner Chappell Roan, that inner Michael Jackson, just don't rush your music. Be yourself, be genuine and just be your own genre.

After the interview I was lucky enough to see Lola perform at SXSW. She performed “Hold It Against Me”, a cover of Quarterflash’s “Harden My Heart”, and her upcoming single “Your Parents Don’t Like Me”, which you can pre-save here.

You can stream “Hold It Against Me” now along with her debut single “Pack It Up”.

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