Tender Creature Embodies Queer Strength in Song

Intersectionality, accessibility, and squashing the sexist, patriarchal norms through queer…

The art of creating music for queer folk-pop duo Tender Creature has seen some shifting and changing since the days of quarantine set in. Luckily for the pair, they are leaning into the uncertainties of what the future holds and providing a safe space for the emotions that arise during these hardships.

Tender Creature is comprised of Steph Bishop (they/them) and Robert Maril (he/him), who were both former bandmates of the queer country band Kings. The two reunited after spending several years apart, pursuing independent musical ventures, and are now re-discovering what was purely magical about their former connection. As they prepare to release their brand-new EP, An Offering, the pair continued to reach out of their comfort zone as the entire set of songs are self-produced and self-recorded.

Though Bishop and Maril have been separated during the quarantine, that hasn’t halted the band’s creative process as they typically reside in opposite sides of the state of New York. Passing tracks back and forth and co-writing songs remotely isn’t new to Tender Creature, however the next steps in releasing new music in the era of social distancing and recommended crowd isolation has the band entering a new unknown.

After recently connected with OUT FRONT about their upcoming new release, Tender Creature explains of their co-writing process, talks of the new EP An Offering, and how their strengths combine to make pure music magic.

Can you talk about how Tender Creature came to be?
Steph Bishop: I just had a few songs sort of in my pocket that I had written, some of them not fully developed yet. I had this idea sort of randomly that I wanted to sing this particular cover song with Robert, which is ended up being on the album, it’s an Anais Mitchell song “‘Coming Down’ and I heard it and I immediately thought of Robert. I sort of pitched it to him and he was super into it, we had a weekend up in my house in upstate New York and it took off from there.

Robert Maril: The time between Kings and Tender Creature, I had learned how to do engineering and music production and I kind of had a fantasy that I would get to produce a record for Steph someday because I love working with Steph, I love their voice and I love their songs.

How did learning the engineering and music production side of things help in the formation of the band?
SB: I feel like that was a big shift for us. The fact that you (Robert) became pretty proficient in the engineering and the digital production, that was kind of a game-changer. It sort of opened everything up and changed the way I write songs; traditionally I sit down with my guitar, I play some chords, I hum over the chords, and I write lyrics.

RM: It’s the John Lennon approach… (both laugh)

SB: But one of the songs on the album we wrote in a way that was completely different than any other way we’ve written. Robert had a beat that he was sort of obsessed with that he had made. He just sent me the beat and I just listened to it alone in my living room, I think I was like decorating the Christmas tree or something, and I just started humming over it. I started writing a melody without being bogged down by chords or an instrument and it felt really freeform. Then we just sort of started building on it from there. It was just a totally different way of writing, and I think it feels to me that it’s like a super exciting direction for us.

Where did the name Tender Creature come from?
RM: I think you made it up, Steph.

SB: Yeah, I did. I was talking about gender stuff with my therapist. He asked me when I was little, how did I identify myself and I started describing myself and he was sort of like, ‘It sounds like you’re just like a little creature.’ I liked the term creature because it was like a gender-neutral, living, being-thing. I don’t know, it sounds kind of woowoo, but I was really drawn to this idea of like I was a creature when I was small and I didn’t have any pressure of putting labels on how I identify. And tender to me is like a very queer reference, to sort
being in touch with your feelings.

RM: I think that there’s something really gender subversive about calling yourself tender, like especially you know American men are not allowed to be tender or not expected to be tender.

How do you feel that your queer identities are revealed in your music?
SB: It’s an interesting question…

RM: I think as somebody that’s not in your brain and has watched you write a lot of lyrics, I think that as queer people, we’re already like thrown outside of ‘typical society’ and we’re already learning how to navigate a lot of complicated situations really early in life. I think that gives us a really unique lens, like it made me really empathetic and able to see things from another point of view, and I think that a lot of the songs are dark, they have a tenderness to them and an empathy to them. That, I think, is a byproduct of being queer.

How did you have to shift your mindset at the beginning of quarantine when it came to releasing the new music?
SB: We were sort of gearing up to play our first live show in a very long time, so we obviously put the brakes on that. We’ve been shifting, I mean before this call, we were working on writing a little bit from afar, sending snippets back and forth to each other. We also recorded a cover by The Cure remotely, so that was kind of fun. We’re trying to work around the quarantine, but it’s definitely a different mindset, for sure.

RM: We were getting ready to start playing live again, we were translating all of our songs and some covers to be a live iteration, and the plan was to start playing out, and release the singles and EP in conjunction with playing live, which is kind of a traditional trajectory to get yourself heard about when that started not being able to happen. We made the decision to work with the PR company Baby Robot and figure out other ways to get the music out there and to get our playing out there, digitally.

When it came to writing An Offering, how prepared were you to have to switch to a remote model of joining creative forces?
SB: Obviously in person is wonderful and ideal, but because we already lived two and a half hours apart, we basically wrote the entire EP from our own homes. So, I feel like we were pretty well set up for this. We would have a couple weeks of sending stuff back and forth and talking about ideas and arranging, and then we would have a weekend together when we were in the same space, and that felt pretty magical to come together in that way, so we’re definitely missing that part.

RM: I think that, like Steph touched on, what felt so magical was when we have all these ideas, and we definitely have always worked really in sync, and I always have felt very safe writing with Steph. That’s a really good environment in which to try new things. What we’re missing is that quick fire exchange of ideas that you have when you’re just singing in a room, I’m playing piano, and Steph’s on their guitar.

Steph, can you talk about your creative relationship with Robert?
Working with Robert is like a living example of yes, and. I feel really safe working with Robert, and not to say that he’s pumping me up or that he thinks all of my ideas are great and I can do no wrong, but he’s always down to try something. He’s always down to push it a little further, and to work with someone who I respect so much and respects me so much, it’s empowering. We see the creative parts of each other and we really feed off of them.

Robert, what has working with Steph inspired your creative process?
I’ve always said for years now that Steph is like my favorite songwriter, honestly. They just has a gift for melody and a gift for harmony, they hear stuff that I don’t hear and brings a tenderness to the proceeding by virtue of their voice, and by virtue of the way that they think about melody. I’m very brash, and loud, and pushy and I’ve listened to like a lot of punk in my life and I think Steph brings a kind of tender strength.

Why did now feel like the right time to release the new music?
RM: So much of this EP to me feels, I don’t want to say comforting because I think that sounds like it’s like bedtime music, but a lot of it feels very open hearted and very soothing, but in like soothing to the soul. There’s a lot of complicated things and a lot of dark stuff on it, but it just feels like something that I would like to give the world right now.

I think that people are ready to start consuming media. I felt like at the beginning of quarantine everybody was just shut down and we were all watching Great British Bake Off. Now I think we’re at a point where we’re ready to start consuming new ideas and are hungry for new ideas.

SB: I also think it’s a hunger for connection in general, and I’ve always felt that way. Whether we’re playing music for people in a room and we’re all in the same room or in this instance it’s sort of like connecting over miles and from our own spaces, I feel like people are really interested in connecting on a lot of different levels right now because we feel so isolated.

What are you most looking forward to as the release date for An Offering approaches?
SB: I think I just want people to hear the record, and one of my favorite things is hearing from folks who connect with something that we’ve written. We’re toying with the idea of doing a couple remixes of some of the songs.

RM: I have always made really intimate relationships with songs forever, and it’s so great to make something that we love, that we think is beautiful, or subversive, or whatever. And like the single, for instance, one of my friends is obsessed with it. He has so much of his own meaning and history onto it, that’s what I like. I like being able to release something that I just like, and then to know that people can see themselves in the record, and it can teach them something about life that they come to on their own.

SB: Yeah, it kind of breaks the whole thing open. After months and years of working on this thing, you think you know it inside and out, and then to see it through other people’s eyes is a really cool thing.

An Offering, the six track EP by Tender Creature, will be available in full on September 18 on the band’s SoundCloud account. Follow Tender Creature on social media for more updates and song releases.