The Kunins: ‘It’s a very self-aware kind of feeling because once you realise that you’re writing about someone, it’s not a feeling that you can turn off’

Meanjin/Brisbane father-daughter folk duo The Kunins (Ken and Lily Maia) will release their third, as of yet untitled, album in October.

The album will comprise 11 tracks, including their August single, the haunting and introspective ‘When The Ink Runs Dry’. With only two guitars and two voices, the result is a performance that is both raw and emotional, getting right to the heart of its subject matter. It explores the uncomfortable reality of having a muse and the transactional nature of that relationship: ‘Sometimes an artist can stay attached to a person because of the inspiration they bring, while knowing that when the inspiration runs out, they will go their separate ways,’ Lily explained. ‘It’s essentially a song that reflects upon how songs are written.’

Fascinatingly, the first line of the song “I was driving to the airport” came to her as she was coming back from dropping her parents off at the airport. ‘It was an instantaneous feeling that came to me,’ she said. ‘It’s interesting, it’s a very self-aware kind of feeling because once you realise that you’re writing about someone, it’s not a feeling that you can turn off once you’re in that headspace. It was a combination of a spark of creativity in the moment but also putting something that I’d been feeling for a while into words and into song.’

Lily’s vocals remind me of 10,000 Maniacs’ frontwoman Natalie Merchant’s on the track, the way her voice both soothes and engages the listener, with both her and her father playing a mesmerising Spanish-style acoustic guitar on it. ‘I grew up singing in a lot of choirs, a bit of musical theatre, but my musical background growing up and going to school was very classical,’ she said. ‘My vocal coach, she does primarily have a background in classical music and opera but I don’t sing opera (laughs). That is very much outside of my zone but it’s nice to be able to bring in a lot of my background as a soprano into this music. I think it’s a little different and something that feels very much like me. I wrote the melody and the chord progression but the song really stepped up to the next level when we started playing it together. I think the magic really does happen when we start collaborating on the instrumental, so we’re both playing guitar on it.’

‘I’m smitten with her voice as a proud dad’

Her dad interjects: ‘It’s good fun for me having always fronted bands and exclusively been the lead singer of everything to actually just occasionally get to be a guitar player,’ he said enthusiastically. ‘On that song, I’m basically singing some harmonies and bits and pieces. Typically with our writing, we don’t co-write that much. I’ll come up with something or Lily will come up with something. And to me, I get a little bit of the best of both worlds because I get to sing lead on four tracks on the upcoming album. This song brings me a lot of joy because Lily is singing the lead on it, I’m smitten with her voice as a proud dad. Also no one really cares about a soon-to-be 57-year-old male singer (laughs). In the commercial world, it’s a little bit easier to sell, let’s put it that way.’

As the track goes: “Mythical love, my heart is built like a stone. It never gets old and pulls me under your spell. One day I will let you go. Only I know when I’ve written all I can write and the ink runs dry.” She describes the song as ‘mostly about feeling a little bit guilty when I know that I’m writing a song about a particular person’: ‘I’m a bit private in terms of my dating life, I don’t really want the people that I write songs about to know it’s about them.’

Her dad looks at her and laughs: ‘It could be a lot worse because a long time ago I wrote a song called ‘Bastard,’ that was about an uninvited house guest who was a friend of a friend,’ he said, clearly still very entertained by the memory. ‘The song did pretty well on the radio. I’m doing a pretty big show one day, and someone goes: “Hey, tell me a story about Bastard”. So I told the story of this guy who came over the day after Thanksgiving. He had the last beer, he finished the last piece of pumpkin pie. He was a terrible guest (laughs). He never said thank you or goodbye because he wasn’t welcome, that was the hook. And lo and behold, I’m three quarters through the story and I look out in the audience and there he is! It must be a family thing. You don’t want to get caught out!’ I ask if he has talked to him since. ‘No, I really happily never talked to him again. I normally have no issues with 99% of humanity but he was that 1% that I didn’t really want much to do with!’

At just 21 years old, Lily Maia has acquired a voice and songwriting ability beyond her years. Her songs draw inspiration from a wide range of sources, including personal experiences, literature and film. For both of them, what will always be most inspiring is trusting in the process and letting the song lead the way. With an already storied career under his belt, Ken has released 11 albums, toured throughout the US, had music featured in TV and film and ran indie label Underhill Recordings. A native to LA, he moved from the U.S. to Australia 24 years ago and has called Brisbane home ever since.

‘I looked over at her and realised that the band mate I’d been looking for had been here all the time’

Endearingly, neither of them initially envisaged being in a band together: ‘When I was growing up, we never thought that we were going to be in a band together,’ Lily said. Her father agreed: ‘I think the first time was 2022 when we first started really considering it. I think I was in this very room that we’re in right now and I was strumming a song that I put out in ’97, which is really dating myself,’ he said laughing. ‘And Lily chimed in with some harmonies on it and I thought “wow”. I looked over at her and realised that the band mate I’d been looking for had been here all the time. I got to see Lily develop quite a bit in the years up and coming. She’d always been very musical and when she started to write songs, the penny just dropped, it was pretty cool.’

Between them, they bring some brilliant influences to the table: ‘When I got my first iPod at about nine, all of dad’s artists on iTunes were automatically loaded in,’ she said. ‘So I had Neil Young and The Beatles. I love The Beatles, they’re my all-time favourite, but I’ve definitely found a lot of my own artists that I like just in today’s music scene. I think a lot of folk influences are probably some of the biggest ones for me, Nick Drake in particular.’ Her dad weighs in: ‘For me, it depends whether I’m more in a rock mode or whether I’m in a singer-songwriter mode,’ he said. ‘One of the songs on the record is called ‘The Greatest Ones Make Me Wanna Cry’. It’s an appreciation of when it’s Saturday night and you’re watching YouTube and they’re showing videos of John Prine or Townes Van Zandt. These are guys that were my heroes as far as that dark Americana goes. Paul Simon forever blows me away. His last record is one of the most impressive things I’ve ever heard. That guy is 80 and like Willie Nelson – Willie’s 92 – still writing incredible, meaningful, provocative work. People go: “Why don’t they quit? Why don’t they retire?” Well, their heroes were these bluesmen that just went on until they died.’

Last year, The Kunins released their second album Waiting for Lily. Recognised for its accomplished songwriting, rich themes and deeply emotional performances, the album was warmly received by Australian audiences. Since its release, the duo have been hard at work on what will be their third album, crafting a collection of music even more ambitious and emotionally resonant.

‘We wanted to create a classic sounding ear worm that any family member can resonate with’

The first of these new songs comes in the form of the recent single ‘One Way Flight’, which they released in June. It marks an evolution in The Kunins’ sound, taking their signature melodies and layering them with sweeping orchestral arrangements. It’s a poignant exploration of generational expectations, telling the story of strong, independent mothers and the challenge of living up to their example. ‘We wanted to create a classic sounding ear worm that any family member can resonate with,’ Ken explained. ‘With the combination of my songwriting and Lily Maia’s voice, we aimed to produce a track that truly represents both of our strengths. We’re really proud of the result.’

It’s a beautiful, evocative piece, opening with a pared back piano line, with Lily on main vocals, with her dad providing backing vocals in the soaring chorus. As it kicks off: “In her heart the Lord protects her. Somehow everything works fine. Most days she walks without direction but she lands on her feet every time.”

When I first heard it, I assumed that Lily had written it about her own mother but it turns out to have an older, more historic provenance, as her dad explains: ‘I grew up in Southern California in the 70’s,’ he said. ‘You had a lot of women that were incredibly strong, particularly from the West Coast, where anything was possible after a period in the 50’s where they didn’t have that kind of freedom. A lot of the time, I saw their daughters that were my age didn’t quite have the same gumption because basically the Reagan years came in and everything got conservative. I thought it was very interesting, just as a spectator. As a writer, I’m always a spectator. I’m always hearing a line, looking at something, reading something, and thinking: “Oh, yeah, I can connect with that”. Hopefully, when you write a song, you have that capacity to connect. There’s probably not that many 50-something-year-old dudes writing songs about strong women of the 70’s (laughs) but it’s a great topic!’

There’s a line in the chorus “It’s a one way flight tonight and ever after” that has stuck with me and I ask them what it references: ‘Essentially that round trips are never guaranteed in this life,’ Ken said.

‘When you’re writing a song, you find yourself singing in a very natural way in the pitches that your voice just naturally does, so it has been fun to mix that up a little bit’

The album also marks a turning point in terms of who sings what: ‘Traditionally, we’ve each sung the songs we’ve written,’ Lily said. ‘However, this album has brought about that change of me singing some of the songs that dad’s written. When you’re writing a song, you find yourself singing in a very natural way in the pitches that your voice just naturally does, so it has been fun to mix that up a little bit.’ Her father agrees: ‘I’ll let one little cat out of the bag that’s going to be kind of interesting. The third release is actually going to be an A-side/B-side in early October and then there’s going to be a single past that, and then we’ll release the name. I think it’ll be a line from a song. I don’t know, we might have to arm wrestle for it!’

Other changes are afoot on the album, as Ken explains: ‘The last record that we did, Waiting for Lily, we decided not to have more than two instruments and two vocals on any song because we wanted to really capture what we do live. Our live thing is all about the intensity of getting a room as quiet as humanly possible, which is the total opposite of rock ‘n’ roll days where it’s all about the energy. This is like teachers talking to kids and bringing their voice down to keep the kids quiet. So with this, it still has an acoustic flavor, but there’s a fair few strings that are involved. On the new record, Lily gets to use some of her violin and classical abilities and I get to play a fair bit of electric guitar as well, which is fun for me. That being said, it’s not too rocky. If there’s electric guitars, it’s more atmospheric. We wanted to really put people into a unique headspace.’

Lyrically, the album explores the idea of seizing a moment and not letting an opportunity pass by. ‘I think the last album was more about the relationships between people but I think this one seems to be about the constant idea of taking control of a moment,’ Lily said. ‘We didn’t plan for that, it just seemed to happen naturally, I think.’ Her father agrees: ‘There are fleeting characters, stories within each song, and they all seem to butt up against some sort of crisis or challenge.’ I ask if the challenges are resolved in the songs. ‘Not necessarily but some are,’ he said. ‘I’d like to think that there’s a glimmer of hope, even in some pretty dark songs. It takes a hell of a lot more, for me at least, to write a happy song than to write one that’s sad. And one song, which is the darkest song on the entire record, for sure, lyrically, is melodically the most major dominant. It’s a strange dichotomy. It’s called ‘Only The Lost Can Understand’. Until someone has really plumbed the depths of anxiety and depression, it’s really hard to communicate that to someone else.’

‘I tend to be prejudiced towards the songs that we finish last’

Lily has a personal favourite on the album: ‘It’s one that Dad wrote and I sing called ‘It’s No Revelation’. It’s acoustic guitar, it’s piano; I feel like I shouldn’t be the one to explain the meaning of the song because I didn’t write it. Do you want to talk about it?,’ she said to her dad, laughing. He jumps in: ‘The main chorus is “Time is a cruel master and you can’t outrun what will come after”. Despite that, where are you going to find that sort of light? Time’s never going to stop. We’re never going to get younger. I think one of the enjoyable things about this process is that we get the viewpoint of someone who’s born in ’68, as opposed to your birthday, which was 2004,’ he said to Lily. ‘We have obviously plenty of things that are similar, it’s the human condition. It’s no revelation that you’re going to wake up certain days and you’re going to feel elated. Other days you’re going to wake up and think, “Wow, that wall just hit me really hard”. I tend to be prejudiced towards the songs that we finish last. My favourite one is one that Lily just completed called ‘The Reaper Has No Shame.’ It’s musically really, really interesting to me, it may be the song that finishes the record.’

His daughter describes it as ‘coming back to that idea of seizing the moment’: ‘It’s about feeling like you’re on top of the world some days and then other times, you feel like it could all come crashing down at any moment,’ she said. ‘It’s a bit angsty but it’s a very fun song to play and it was very fun to record as well. It’s a bit more experimental.’

If she could go out for a night with any musician, Lily is quick to say 1975 frontman Matt Healey: ‘He’s a very controversial gentleman. I think I’d like to just ask him: “How do you have such a controversial persona and how are you so committed to making good, interesting pop music?” I think he’s someone that whether you like him or hate him – and there’s probably lots of reasons to maybe not like some of the things that he says – he’d have some very interesting stories to tell. Actually, I do know one funny little thing about him (laughs). The studio that we recorded the last album in, apparently, he also recorded there and was violently ill in that studio. I wonder what the full backstory to that is?!’

Her dad is deep in thought: ‘I’d probably be caught in between one dead person and one living person,’ he said. ‘The dead person might be Tom Petty because I’m a huge Tom Petty fan. That’s the most upset I’ve been when an artist died. I remember clearly when John Lennon died and that was pretty horrible. Part of me thinks maybe I should say Bob Dylan, just to see if he’s taking the piss more than people realise! We’ve got tickets for a show in January for a guy that I think is the next Bob Dylan and the next John Prine rolled up in one, and I think the most important voice in America, which is Jesse Welles. We’re pretty productive, we’ll be releasing three records in the space of 18 months but he’s done five in a year. I’ve never seen a talent quite like his. He’s going to be coming to Brisbane and I’m trying to somehow figure out who does his booking to see if there’s any chance that we could actually open for him. He has a soulfulness that emits without judgment, he’s really good at unfolding things and that’s hard. Folk music is naturally very preachy and sometimes you have to not be too preachy (laughs). We make a point to not walk in the realm of politics with our music. I remember at 21 or 22 having a few political songs and I think I just woke up to the fact that you know nothing and everyone will know that the second you open your mouth (laughs). So just keep your mouth shut!’