Marika Hackman by Pip for Dirty Hit Records

Practice doesn’t always make perfect. Sometimes, musical perfection is achieved not by growing squinty-eyed and calloused from running scales for days on end, but rather by harnessing that elusive ‘je ne sais quoi’ that causes a song to rumble through your nervous system. This is the quality that caused Hampshire born songwriter, Marika Hackman, to fall in love with the artists who would lead her to forge a musical career of her own.

We caught up with her ahead of the release of her forthcoming EP, Deaf Heat. Marika told us about the artists who inspired her to start playing music. “Laura Veirs made me pick up a guitar and start teaching myself, as did any of those artists ten years ago who weren’t virtuosic in their playing but could write a gut-wrenching song.  I suppose a lot of the stuff we used to listen to growing up was quite musically intimidating, like Frank Zappa, Steely Dan or Led Zeppelin, so when I started to discover artists whose songs I could work out on a guitar it was a revelation; if I can play your song, why can’t I write my own?”

In the beginning, though she did struggle with some of the technical work, her love of music and determination saw her accept the challenge. “I was never any good at reading music so I found the piano immensely difficult.  I enjoy playing the guitar, just because I find it the easiest to play, I also still like to have a go on the drums, although its quite frustrating because I seem to have lost all skill that I once used to possess.  Like I said, I find piano tricky, I think its a case of actually being able to see what your hands are doing, I start to over think things and second guess myself.  It’s like my hands get all self conscious when I play the piano.”

Her efforts have clearly paid off because Marika’s unique style of folk music with a contemporary twist is wonderfully crafted. Marika describes songwriting as ‘an inate part‘ of herself. “It was never a decision, it just happened.”

That said, her creative process is something that Marika works very hard at. “It’s not a particularly exciting process, I just sit in my room and play my guitar for hours on end and sometimes something happens and I’ll have a song, or at least half a song.

Of course, it’s no accident that Marika began making music- with the Hackman’s, its a bit of a family affair, “My parents can both play a selection of instruments and my dad used to run a little recording studio in London in the ’80s.  As well as that my Grandmother is a piano teacher and my Grandfather plays a mean sax.”

As well as at home, Marika was nurtured musically at school. She considers herself to have been very fortunate to have had the opportunity to attend the liberal Bedales School. “I was so incredibly lucky to go to a school like Bedales, and I think I was even luckier that I realised that whilst I was still there.  I basically threw myself at everything the school could offer which meant being involved in a lot of plays and concerts.  I was given a platform to explore songwriting in the safe and cosy confines of the school bubble.  I guess that gave me the confidence to consider a future in the music industry.”

Bedales counts such musical luminaries as Lily Allen and Patrick Wolf as alumni. Marika found a musical affinity with model and peer, Cara Delevingne and the pair performed in some in-house productions together, “I remember we did Brimful of Asha once, I was on the drums and Cara was playing guitar and singing, it was just a bit of a laugh, we were only 14 at the time.”

Marika began playing gigs properly from the age of sixteen. Though she’s only a handful of EPs into her career, she’s pretty at home on the stage. Some of her biggest shows to date included opening for Laura Marling on the Australian and European legs of her 2013 tour but Marika counts her own packed out show at Brighton’s The Great Escape Festival last year as her most memorable to date. “The show I played at the Great Escape last year was amazing.  I just wasn’t expecting that many people to come and the church was completely full.  The crowd were so amazing as well, completely silent whilst I was singing but not afraid to go a bit wild between songs, I was actually quite overwhelmed.”

Somehow, Festival Season is almost upon us once again. We asked Marika which ones she’s looking forward to playing this year. “I’m really looking forward to playing Latitude this year, mainly because I’ve heard such lovely things about it and also because I was supposed to play it last year but went to Australia instead.  I also cant wait to play the Great Escape again, I hope its as much fun as it was last time.”

Following the release of ‘Dead Heat’ on 14 April, Marika plans to retire to the studio to work on her debut LP. She told us that she’s been on musical lock-down while she has been writing. “I haven’t really been listening to anyone recently as I’m polishing up all my songs to get them ready to go into the studio, and that would be very distracting.”

However , when she gets a chance, she enjoys spending some quality listening time with other female artists.“I was listening to Warpaint’s new album a lot prior to knuckling down, and Edith Frost too.”

Finally, we asked her where she hopes that 2014 will take her,  and it seems that Marika Hackman is a young lady who really has her priorities in order when she says, “Like with every other year in my life, anywhere that makes me happy.”