Name 3 Songs: You’ve been pursuing a career in music since you were a teenager. You started with the band Echo Smith with your siblings, and left the project around 2016. There’s this idea that the entertainment industry can be very cutthroat, especially for young talent, and sometimes take advantage of those who may not be as industry savvy. Was it tough for you navigating your way through this while being a young adult in the industry?

Meija: Yeah, definitely. Exactly to your point, it can be very cutthroat and especially with a young artist. There’s definitely a lot of people who want to take advantage – maybe that’s a strong word, but I guess at the end of the day, that ends up being what happens because you are so excited to be doing any kind of opportunity that’s brought to you. You say yes to every single thing imaginable. And it’s really easy to get burnt out.

I had that experience with Echosmith when we were also young. I was the oldest in the band but still was like, I started touring when I was 18 or 19. So I was excited to do it, I was excited to do everything and I got super burnt out and it never stopped coming. And I think it was hard, it felt really hard to say no to people who say they know how things are supposed to go or they know what’s best for your project.

And I imagine also when you’re that age, you’re so excited of like, you’re like, this is what I’ve been wanting to be doing, this is what I’ve been doing, and you’re like, here’s the opportunity, and it feels like that, how could I say no?

Yeah, when you’re getting all those amazing opportunities, it’s hard to say no. This is the dream, but if you say yes too much or do too many things… you don’t even – I didn’t even end up really remembering or appreciating any of these like big, huge moments. I look back at pictures sometimes, I’m like, I don’t really remember that day or what was happening there. Or friends have brought that up to me too. Like, “Oh my God, I saw this crazy video where you guys are performing in front of 50,000 people.” And they showed me the video, I’m like, I don’t remember it.

Frankly too, it has nothing to do with substances or anything on the road. Just literally, it was such a whirlwind that I did have a hard time placing when things or where I was, what city I was in.

Yeah, no, it’s like an excitement blackout where it’s like there’s so much happening, you have so much adrenaline, so much dopamine that one second you’re on stage and the second you’re off you’re in a new place. That’s not something you can even be prepared for. And so now that you’re at this stage in your career where you’ve been a solo artist for five years now – looking back on your time in the band, do you feel like there could have been more done to prepare you for success?

Yeah, I mean, it’s hard to really prepare yourself for that. I think the biggest thing I saw at the time is that you never know obviously how things are going to go. And especially in the music industry, it’s like things blow up overnight all the time. For a lot of people, it’s after working really hard for a long time. I was already touring and on the road for a year and a half before “Cool Kids” started to do anything. And then all of sudden it was like, once that happened, everyone’s like, okay, now it’s time to get going.

Now it’s gonna really go and like I’ve already was kind of tight. We were working super hard for a long time before that. We were touring that record already for a year and a half and then it blew up. And so I think a big thing, I don’t know if this is a preparation thing, but it’s like, you gotta take care of yourself and not burn yourself out too quick because then if things do happen, you’re already burnt out by the time it’s starting to work.