Celine Simard: Purely Chemical

Celine Simard (Celin) grew up in Fahler, Alta., the "Honey Capital of Canada," but she found her voice in the isolation of a 28-day quarantine. From the Young Canadians to the King Eddie, Celin is part of the creative "explosion" that has transformed Airdrie over the last five years.

In this episode, she performs:

• "14 Days" (The quarantine anthem)
• "Pray On" (A controversial take on infidelity)
• "Purely Chemical" (Addressing the brain’s imbalance)

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

I'm just gonna pick someone and just like stare at them every time I'm like pissed. I was like, so who are you to judge me?

SPEAKER_01 0:10

Well, girls out of town, you've been sleeping.

SPEAKER_00 0:15

I can't welcome back to another episode of Airdrie Inside. I'm very excited to have another musical guest. These are my favorite podcasts. Celine Samard, welcome to the show. Thank you for having me. I love how you introduced your name when I was trying to figure out if it was Celine or Celine. You said it was.

SPEAKER_03 0:40

It's um Insulin, but just Celine. Just Celine.

SPEAKER_00 0:44

So just a beautiful way of saying it. Uh welcome to the show. And it's great to have a fellow Mustang on the show.

SPEAKER_03 0:50

Yeah, Mustangs.

SPEAKER_00 0:51

See, uh, we had a run of Birchurch Chargers and Croxford Cavaliers. I just can't have that. Uh so I have to keep coming back to the uh black and silver that we love. Uh tell me a little bit about yourself.

SPEAKER_03 1:04

Um well, yeah, I'm Celine. I uh I started pursuing music at a young age, I guess, but only in the last couple years have I pursued like a solo career and make this my full time. Okay. Um, which is exciting, but I've always been around music. My family is very musical. I have two sisters that are also singers. And oh wow. So it's a family affair. Yes, it is.

SPEAKER_00 1:27

And w what what did your mom grow up singing? What were you around as a kid?

SPEAKER_03 1:32

Well, when I was a kid, we we grew up in a small town in northern Alberta.

SPEAKER_00 1:36

The honey capital of Canada. Yes. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 1:38

How did you know?

SPEAKER_00 1:40

I do my research.

SPEAKER_03 1:41

Oh. The honey capital of Canada. Yeah. Falair.

SPEAKER_00 1:45

Falaire, yes. I I wasn't quite sure how to pronounce it, but uh I knew it was the honey capital.

SPEAKER_03 1:49

Falher.

SPEAKER_00 1:50

Falher.

SPEAKER_03 1:50

Falair, Faler Falar. It's like a French, yeah. It's like a French community up north. But yeah, we um grew up there. My mom grew up playing in different bands, um, kind of doing like all the weddings in town, all the kind of events. Yeah, and she put out a four-track vinyl EP.

SPEAKER_00 2:12

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 2:13

Back in the day.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

Remember when we used to have vinyl? I you don't because you're too young, but I remember it, and now it's making a comeback. I have a record player. It's great to listen to.

SPEAKER_03 2:23

So Me too, yes. Okay, so I've got a collection.

SPEAKER_00 2:26

And were you a young Canadian? I read that as well.

SPEAKER_03 2:29

Yes, yeah. I did the I did the Young Canadians for about six years. Yeah, so from 2009 until 2014.

SPEAKER_00 2:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 2:37

Yeah, so that was a big part of my life growing up. I remember I didn't know how to dance at all. Like, we just knew how to sing as kids. Like my mama taught us how to sing, but not to dance. So when I showed up, I was wearing jeans and a t-shirt. All these kids are like, hair slipped back, ready to audition, and I am not even going the right way, like, didn't even know we had to dance, just coming from this small town, being like, oh, we want to like take advantage of this opportunity to be a part of this program. And yeah, I think it took my third time auditioning and I got in. I learned how to, you know, chaussé. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 3:15

I was gonna say, are we gonna see some dance moves or just the music today?

SPEAKER_03 3:20

I've retired.

SPEAKER_00 3:21

Okay, that's fine. I I I I I'm not a very good dancer either, but uh so tell me a little bit about uh what kind of music you like and and what are some of your inspirations that got you uh into this.

SPEAKER_03 3:34

Yeah, uh I like a variety of different stuff. I feel like I'm inspired by a lot of different things. I mean Stevie Wonder is a huge, huge one for me. Um, Stevie Wonder, Prince, Amy Winehouse, those are like the classics that I love. Just songwriting.

SPEAKER_00 3:54

You're taking uh people from my heart here. Prince is my favorite artist by far. And uh yeah, by far. Not even close. Nothing compares to you, is in my mind the boat best written, most well-composed song there's ever been. I can never take the place of your man. There's so many good Prince songs out there.

SPEAKER_03 4:12

There's so many, so many. And just the fact that he's like a true artist is incredible. Just writes, produces, does all the instrumentation. Like it's it's wild. It it's but it's doable. Like you see something like that, an artist like that, and it inspires you right to want to like me. Right now, I'm learning how to produce more and trying to be a jack of all traits, because why not?

SPEAKER_00 4:38

Right. The craziest thing was I was not a Prince fan until uh he came to Calgary, and I bought tickets to see it because everybody was going, and I was mesmerized by what I saw somebody who could sing, dance, play the guitar like like nobody I've ever seen. And then you realize that you know, he just picks up another instrument and starts playing it perfectly, and then another one, and you're like, What am I seeing? What am I hearing? What am I experiencing? It was crazy. And I had the same experience with Stevie Wonder, too. I I saw him in concert too, and he was mind-blowing. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 5:09

His concert was I didn't see Prince. My mom saw Prince. She said it was incredible. Incredible. But Stevie Wonder, I saw at the dome in like 2015, maybe or something. Yeah, it was incredible. The way that he would just command an entire stadium, like you're singing this part, you're singing that part, go, and then he would just stop everything. No, no, no, that's not right. That's not right. It goes like this. And he would like restart it and just, yeah, it was wild. He's a true musician.

SPEAKER_00 5:37

Hearing Superstition Live was probably a core memory of mine that I'm gonna live with for a while.

SPEAKER_04 5:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:43

And then Amy Winehouse. Uh, I never did get to see her, but love her music as well. So, okay, so uh is that the type of music you play?

SPEAKER_03 5:53

Um, those are kind of my my classic inspirations. Yes. I just love their songwriting. I mean, with my my songs, yes, there's a lot of inspiration from that. There's a lot of kind of like funk soul, some jazz kind of that I'm pulling from those kind of artists, but I think modern day influences are more apparent. I want to kind of move more towards a like instead of classic soul, like Stevie Wonder, more Neo Soul, more like Olivia Dean, Alan Stone kind of very cool current vibes. But I feel like I I just pull from so many different places, and I don't know, it just all goes into a bowl, and then it's that's that's what I sound like.

SPEAKER_00 6:40

I was gonna try to wait longer to ask this, but I I I would love to hear you sing and play, and then we'll get back to the interview. Are you feeling like playing a song for me?

SPEAKER_01 6:49

Yeah, let's do it.

SPEAKER_00 6:50

Okay, yeah. Britt's gonna grab your guitar here and uh thank you. What am I gonna hear first?

SPEAKER_03 7:00

All right. Um first song I'll play for you is this is gonna be on my next EP.

SPEAKER_00 7:09

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 7:10

During COVID, I had to quarantine for quite some time. I I was traveling. Um I was in Bali at the time, and then but I was living in Australia. So when COVID hit, I had to go back to Australia, but then I had to quarantine for 14 days. Right. And then the world was ending, and I had just spent all my money in like in Thailand and Bali. So my mom was like, the world's ending, you have to come home. So then I came home to Canada, quarantined again, quarantined again. So I quarantined for 28 days, 14 days back to back. Um, and you know, be stuck with yourself for a whole month straight alone, and you you go a little stir crazy for sure. Yeah. Um, so this is a song that I wrote during that time, I guess. When I was just it's a very introspective song of just kind of me and my thoughts because I wasn't talking to anyone, so it's just me in my head.

SPEAKER_00 8:09

I love it.

SPEAKER_03 8:09

I think a lot of people can relate to that moment, so I yes, I feel like most people did the quarantine thing.

SPEAKER_00 8:16

So yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 8:19

Um, yeah, so this one's called 14 days. It's coming out on my EP in um April. Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:55

Surface to your mind and overflow. Nobody by our side can avoid dealing. We'll swallow in your pride so you don't choke. Oh, I know it can be hard to face your demons, the terrifying secrets that you hide. At night they haunt you, keeping you from dreaming, scared to sleep and feel what they'll find. Oh fourteen days alone, still so far from home, slowly losing my mind, locked up with myself. How do I keep from going wrote? Do you ever close your eyes back when the memories collide? And the dirt won't wash off your feet. Will I been there more than once or twice? Never seen my glimpse of paradise. Will my sins come back to bite me? Fourteen days alone, still so far from home, slowly losing my mind, locked up with myself. How do I keep from going wrote? One of the someone I used to be, she's gone and that's fine. I need it to be set free fourteen days alone. Follow losing my mind locked up with myself. How do I keep from going fourteen days alone? Still so far from home losing my mind, locked up with myself. How do I keep from going rogue? How do I keep from going wrogue? How do I keep from go?

SPEAKER_00 11:48

That was fantastic. You kept looking at me and I had this smile from ear to ear on my face. It was fantastic.

SPEAKER_03 11:56

What a nice song. Thanks. I appreciate that.

SPEAKER_00 11:58

You know, it it's funny because uh when you were telling me how you wrote that, the genesis of it makes complete sense with the lyrics and it's entirely relatable to everybody who went through that kind of having to be in their own head for that long.

SPEAKER_03 12:13

Totally. Thank you. Thank you. I feel like so sometimes most of the time I try to explain that.

SPEAKER_00 12:19

Right.

SPEAKER_03 12:19

Because I feel like it makes people uh relate a bit more to the words, probably. But um, yeah, glad to hear it makes sense.

SPEAKER_00 12:27

So this is something I'm seeing uh since we've started this project at Airdry Inside. Uh, the level of talent that's coming out of Airdrie right now uh that's been incubated in our environment is kind of blowing my mind here. Uh tell me what it's like to be part of the larger arts community here.

SPEAKER_03 12:47

Yeah, I feel very proud of everyone in Airdrie. I know when I was just kind of fresh 18, working at just a pub and we were hosting an open mic, I remember seeing people um like Maya Kate was playing at the open mic, Eden Taylor played at the open mic, Haley Isabel played at the open mic, their first open mic ever. And it's so amazing to see everyone's, myself included, um, everyone's growth from that point, you know, even just how long ago was that? Five years ago, maybe?

SPEAKER_00 13:23

Well, right, and that's when the explosion really took place. I I really saw this group of artists just break out and just get so creative and get such recognition for it. It's been been really fun to watch. Uh, like you said you moved here in 2006. Yeah. Did you ever think the arts and culture community would be this vibrant?

SPEAKER_03 13:42

Well, we were kind of seeking it in Calgary, like we were going to the Young Canadians to go and do the art stuff, right? But then when I actually started performing independently and getting into the community, then you realize that there's a lot more in your town than you thought of, right?

SPEAKER_00 14:00

Right.

SPEAKER_03 14:00

Yeah. Yeah. It's been it's been great to see. Um, I feel like people do go to Cowrie to kind of seek things, but then there's always something going on in Airdrie. There's always some event or showcase that you discover a new Airdrie artist. And yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:17

Yeah. And every time I do, I just uh fall in love. Okay, what else do you have for me? You look like you're itching to keep playing. I can see the energy in your hands, and you keep yeah.

SPEAKER_03 14:27

It was the late night coffee. That's okay. I'm like moving around. Um I just released I just released a song on Wednesday. So I released a track, just a single. It's gonna be also included on my EP.

SPEAKER_00 14:40

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 14:41

Um, this song is called Prayon.

SPEAKER_00 14:43

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 14:44

Okay. It's uh a deep story about a complicated kind of love.

SPEAKER_00 14:49

Oh boy.

SPEAKER_03 14:50

So yeah, it's uh it's told from the perspective of the other woman.

SPEAKER_00 14:58

So kind of that uh Reba McIntyre vibe there. Okay, I got you.

SPEAKER_03 15:03

It's kind of controversial, I would say, but it it it kind of humanizes the other woman.

SPEAKER_00 15:09

Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:10

Me and my buddy, we played in a band for years and we we were doing so much songwriting. We were always writing about infidelity, and it was it was like, okay, enough about like he cheated on me, she cheated on me, right? We were like, oh, we both relate to this because it's happened to us. Yeah. And we decided we ended up just pivoting, and one day we wrote a song about the person who, like, from the point of view of the person who is doing the cheating, and then we wrote a song about the person who like the third party. Third party, yeah, the third party involved, the other woman or the other man, right? So we were just trying to pivot with perspectives still on the topic of infidelity, you know, but uh okay.

SPEAKER_00 15:53

So we go from quarantine to infidelity. Let's let's hear it.

SPEAKER_03 15:56

It's a great transition. I was gonna say from quarantine to infidelity, the name of the podcast.

SPEAKER_00 16:01

The next song's about murder.

SPEAKER_03 16:04

Exactly. How did you know? All right, yeah, this is called Pray On.

SPEAKER_00 16:11

Pray on.

SPEAKER_01 16:38

Say there's no future. I'm hidden in your bed, your sheets dirty with secrets. Well, I'm stripping you down time to clean out my conscience, so light a candle for your morals, cause you won't get forgiveness with God as my witness, and I hope she don't find out what you're doing, who you've been screwing. We'll pray on Well cause I'm done, I'm not your patron saint, you must atone for your sin. Well pray on Wause I'm done in silence of remain, but this halo is thinning, and I'm not saving you, no, I'm not saving you. So who are you to judge me? While your girls out of town, you've been sleeping around. I'm no angel for your pleasure. Sure, I'll take you to heaven, but won't appear in your leisure now. So don't you burden me with your sins unfaithfully hersing the grave that you're digging, and honestly I hope that she finds out what you're doing who you've been screwing or pray on or cause I'm done, I'm not your patron saint you must atone for your sinning or pray on or cause I'm done in silence of remain, but this halo is thinning I'm not saving you. No, I'm not saving you. No, I'm not saving you. No, I'm not saving you. I'm not saving, I'm not saving, I'm not saving you, I'm not saving, I'm not saving, I'm not saving you pray on 'cause I'm done. I'm not your patron saint you must atone for your sinning or pray on or cause I'm done in silence I'll remain but this halo is thinning and I'm not saving you, I'm not saving you No, I'm not saving you No, I'm not saving you Pray on cause I'm done in silence of me.

SPEAKER_00 20:49

Well done. Okay, so that's a different experience. The first song, you'd look at me and I'd smile because it was I was enjoying it. This time when you looked at me, I'm like, I didn't do it. I'm not the guy. Exactly. Why are you so mad at me? I I really felt that. I felt a lot of pressure on me here.

SPEAKER_03 21:07

I've had that feedback so many times when I sing this song live, especially in like a quieter room. People are scared of me.

SPEAKER_00 21:16

Yeah, a very beautiful song, but uh I'm so nervous. I'm not going to get on your bad side here. So, okay, so you talk a little bit about the writing process. So you were trying to go around when you were talking about infidelity, uh, all the different perspectives. Uh, what is your process for writing songs? I find that fascinating of trying to put yourself in different shoes and write from that perspective. Tell me about that.

SPEAKER_03 21:43

Um yeah, I feel like so. For a long time I wrote with the same people. I would do co writes, like that's kind of how I started writing. Yeah. It was co writes. I was always writing with those people that I felt comfortable with, right? Um

SPEAKER_00 22:00

And is there a partnership there where the when you say comfortable, feeling vulnerable, being able to share ideas and stories or Yeah, totally.

SPEAKER_03 22:09

I feel like it's pretty intimidating, especially when you first start songwriting, to be in a room with people and to be pitching your ideas, but you're so in your head, you're like, should I even say this? You know, it's to be comfortable is to just be able to shout something out and you don't even care if it's a good idea or not.

SPEAKER_00 22:27

You're just no bad ideas in a brainstorm.

SPEAKER_03 22:29

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Um, I've gotten over that, like even in a room with someone new. I'm usually decent at just kind of getting over that hump of being like, no, we're we're just pitching ideas, we're just kind of talking it out.

SPEAKER_00 22:43

Well, one day we're gonna have to write a song. I think this could work. What do you think, Britain? We could do a songwrite here, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 22:49

Have you done a songrate before?

SPEAKER_00 22:50

No, I have not, but I I have weird, crazy ideas all the time.

SPEAKER_03 22:53

So should we document it?

SPEAKER_00 22:55

Uh I think that would be great. We could do it, a 40-minute podcast on that. Songwriting workshop. It's by no means the same genre you're singing, but I don't know if you are familiar with a band called The Weaker Thans.

SPEAKER_03 23:06

The Weaker Thans?

SPEAKER_00 23:07

Yeah. They write a song, and I you have to listen to it on the way home because it's the most unique song I've ever heard. It's uh a plea from a cat named Vertute, and it's written from the point of view of a cat of a depressed man. And the cat is just like, What is wrong with you? Yeah, and you could really feel this cat seeing it from the eyes of like, I just want to be a cat and play, and you're all depressed and sad. So I highly recommend you listen to it on your way home. It's it's like a punk kind of song. Yeah. But uh again, putting yourself in different shoes is just an amazing, uh, amazing skill to have. So tell me a little bit about what's coming up for you. Because you talked about an EP release. Uh first of all, I'm assuming we could find you on Apple Music, Spotify, all of the all of the all of the Yes, all of the olives and all the all of the all the places. Um everywhere. Okay, and what's coming up?

SPEAKER_03 24:06

Coming up for me right now. So I just released a song on Wednesday. So so kind of, yeah, pray on. Uh so focusing on on pushing that a bit more here. Um, I will be playing with a friend of mine at the King Eddie on Saturday, which is fun. Super fun. Um, but the majority of it is kind of focused on the EP release, so I don't have a set date for the EP release yet. Um, just waiting to kind of submit everything and choose the date. I do have a EP show though. Oh, excellent. Uh, EP release show, which is also not the title that it's gonna be, but you know. Um so April 10th, it is gonna be a full band show at the Prairie Emporium in um in Calgary, which is a great little venue. Um, so yeah, that's gonna be really exciting. I I do a few full band shows a year, which are so fun to do. It just kind of brings my music to life, which is amazing. So I'm playing with the same band that I had played with last year for my single release. And yeah, so we're playing April 10th. I'm also gonna be doing like a little kind of weekend tour run to um Kelowna playing. Oh, excellent. Yeah, opening for uh uh an artist out there uh at Redbird on April 4th.

SPEAKER_00 25:27

Okay, so if you want to travel and follow along, you can go to Kelowna, get out of the get out of the snow.

SPEAKER_03 25:32

If you're in Kelowna.

SPEAKER_00 25:33

Okay, if you're in Kelowna, why don't we do that? We don't have a lot of Airdrie Inside isn't big in Kelowna. Uh we don't have a huge crossover, but we might get some fans.

SPEAKER_03 25:42

Maybe. Maybe from us mentioning Kelowna.

SPEAKER_00 25:46

Absolutely. We could get Kelowna trending.

SPEAKER_03 25:48

That'd be great. Well, yeah, no, I'm I'm basically kind of focusing on um just I I have some shows and stuff this month in March, but I'm just kind of planning all of my summer plans and then yeah, starting with a little bit of a a weekend run out to Kelowna in April and then the full band show April 10th.

SPEAKER_00 26:11

And where can people find out about you on social media? What's your what's your Instagram? What's websites?

SPEAKER_03 26:16

Yeah, I mean my website is probably the best bet. You can find any tour dates, any shows that I'm playing in Calgary or Airdrie. Um, so that is just salinmusic.com. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 26:27

Yeah. Perfect. And will you play one more to end the show for me? I could. That would be awesome. I guess. I don't want to scare you though. No, yes. Like I said, I'm scared quarantine, infidelity, I'm not sure what's next.

SPEAKER_03 26:40

Mental health.

SPEAKER_00 26:40

Mental that works for me. That's not as bad as the uh middle one.

SPEAKER_03 26:47

We're healing now. We're healing.

SPEAKER_00 26:49

We're healing together.

SPEAKER_03 26:50

Um, yeah, I'll play I'll play this. It was my first single that I put out. This is called Purely Chemical. Okay. This was a song that I wrote with um Steve Jebney.

SPEAKER_00 26:59

Friend of the pod. He's been on the show before.

SPEAKER_03 27:01

Yeah, he's wonderful. So we wrote this. It was quite a fun writing process. We just hung out, and then four hours later we had a full song and demo of it. So crazy. It was I've never written that. I had never written a song that quick until that session with Steve. So it was a great chemistry to write with him. And yeah, we came up with this song. It's just a song, you know, when things get hard, you feel super lost and feel like you're spiraling, and it's just kind of addressing the fact that sometimes like in the name of the song, purely chemical, like sometimes there's an imbalance in your in your brain. In the chemistry in your brain. You know, there's nothing you can do about it. Life is like that. It's it's how we live. Um, but yeah, this is called purely chemical.

SPEAKER_00 27:48

Excellent, thank you.

SPEAKER_01 27:54

Out of body as I'm standing still in time, my ideas haunt me. Think I must be out my mind. I'm spiraling down, feel it in my bones to feed on the ground. Heart is heavy as a stone, don't wanna be found. I can do this on my own. Hey, last my mind. I try to run away from all the pain inside, but he'll go again for beyond. I pick up all the pieces of my broken life. It's purely chemical out of balance. Seems I cannot walk the line. Let this be my less stance. I'm taking backwards my spiraling down, feel it in my bones to feed on the ground. Heart is heavy as a stone, don't want to be found. I can do this on my heart. Lust my mind. I try to run away from all the pain inside, but if we go again for being pick up all the pieces of my broken life, it's purely chemical, purely chemical, purely chemical, purely chemical, purely chemical, lust my mind. I try to run away from all the pain, but here wake up again last I try to run away from all the pain inside, but here we go again for behind. I pick up all the pieces of my broken life, it's pure the chemical, purely chemical, purely chemical, pure chemical, pure chemical, Celine music, everybody.

SPEAKER_00 31:39

Again, absolutely fantastic. Thank you so much for spending some time with us. I love your voice, I love your style, I love everything about you. You're gonna be a huge star.

SPEAKER_03 31:49

Thank you. Thanks so much for having me. This is awesome.

SPEAKER_00 31:52

Excellent. And thank you for being here on Airdrie Inside. We're gonna be back with great new shows coming up soon.