I’m thinking a Britney Spears cover, cuz why not?” said singer-songwriter Maeve Steele, in response to whether or not the set lists of her upcoming virtual concerts will be exclusive to her own material.
Among a few potential surprise selections, Steele will be performing songs from her new EP, Barefoot—set to be released on Friday, July 31—during her Coastline Livestream Series on Facebook. While each concert is free to view, 100 percent of donations collected will go to support different hunger relief organizations located along California’s coastline.
“It’s a virtual tip jar basically. I didn’t want to put a financial burden on anyone, especially while everyone’s home quarantining,” Steele said. “I didn’t want to stop anyone from having access to some entertainment.”
Described in press materials as a pop-noir songstress, Steele has been involved with music in some form or another nearly her whole life.
“I started playing violin when I was 3. Then when I was 10 or 11, I started teaching myself guitar,” she said. “I grew up in a really musical household. My parents always stressed that music was a crucial part of our education.”
Having grown up in the San Francisco Bay Area and currently residing in Los Angeles, Steele’s familiarity with the Central Coast is mostly through road trips to visit family and friends back home.
“That drive up and down the coast is very familiar to me,” said Steele, who will perform on Thursday, July 30, at 11 a.m., to benefit the Foodbank of Santa Barbara County.
“I feel like hunger is something that is affecting so many people, but it’s kind of overlooked,” Steele said. “We’re in this time in history when so many people are facing economic hardship. People are kind of redefining their sense of normal.
“Kids don’t have access to school lunches; a few dollars can directly go to a kid’s meal,” she added about why she decided to use her new EP tour to benefit hunger relief programs.
Steele wrote all four songs on Barefoot before the end of 2019 and admits she didn’t feel like writing much of anything new during the course of quarantine, despite the expectations of others.
“When it [quarantine] first started, everyone was like, ‘Oh this is perfect, you can just write songs all day, you’re gonna have so much creative output.’ And I was really frustrated because I didn’t want to write anything,” she said. “I was so annoyed at myself.”
She said she felt much better once she accepted that staying home doesn’t necessarily signal an obligatory creative breakthrough.
The debut of Barefoot marks her first full-length project. One thread that ties the songs together is a theme of finding happiness through independence—a feeling she embraced when venturing out to live on her own in LA.
“I wrote these songs last summer when I was in LA, I was kind of testing out living here for a few months before actually moving last month,” Steele said. “I just felt a sense of freedom and openness, and kind of just, happy. Which sounds so corny, but I think that’s part of growing up—learning what makes you happy. It was definitely that sentiment that inspired the EP.”
Arts Editor Caleb Wiseblood wants to hear your cover song requests at [email protected].
