Wang created her entire album in her home studio, “The Blue Room.”
Anna Wang’s rock and roll origin story is a journey through the bright, bubblegum fields of electropop.
Wang, 27, was born in China to type-A parents with visions of a daughter who’d be both a med school grad and a classical pianist. Instead, they instilled a stubborn determination that drove her to pursue her own musical dreams. Back in 2009, Wang emerged fronting the guitar-pop band Anna Wang & the Oh Boys! Eight years later, she’s releasing In Your Head, a 10-song collection of synthesizer-driven pop songs she composed and recorded in the coziness of her home studio. She’ll debut the disc at a release party Dec. 15 at The Frequency.
“Realizing my own sound is something I’ve always wanted to do,” says Wang. “It’s part of getting older and marginally wiser.”
It’s also her way of overcoming personal obstacles. Wang’s been inspired to write songs since a childhood spent bopping around Florida, Boston and finally, Madison, but she suffers from problems with the Eustachian tube in one of her ears, which made recording songs challenging.
“One of my ears sounds like a blown-out speaker all the time,” Wang says.
The solution was simple: Convert the spare bedroom into a personal recording studio she dubbed “The Blue Room,” a place where she could mess with her muse free of distractions. In Your Head finds Wang’s voice confidently exploring topics she’s tackled before — love and relationships — but in a far more musically mature manner.
A solo release represents something of an unexpected turn for Wang. When we last heard from her, it was as one-half of The Tortoise and the Finch, an ad hoc group Wang constructed with longtime musical pal Jeremy Van Mill to compete in — and win — this year’s 105.5 Triple M Radio Project M contest; they came out on top on the strength of “Keep Me Warm,” the single they composed and recorded specifically for the competition.
“Ashes,” one of the album’s several catchy cuts, chronicles Wang’s journey to learn to produce her own songs. It’s the first song she recorded in the Blue Room.
“All of my songs come from an emotion,” she says. “But then they turn into something different. It’s like zooming in on two seconds of emotion and blowing it up into something much bigger.”
In Your Head will likely be the last Anna Wang solo album — but not because she’s giving up producing and recording music. She’s just wary of building her brand with such a common first and last name. “There’s like a million Anna Wangs in Madison,” she says.
In the meantime, it’s all about finally taking the wraps off the music she’s been crafting for more than two years.
“I want to make people feel something,” she says. “I love when other people can relate to me.”
