We were lucky to catch up with Delaney Hafener recently and have shared our conversation below.
Delaney, appreciate you joining us today. Are you happy as a creative professional? Do you sometimes wonder what it would be like to work for someone else?
I actually do have a regular job, sometimes it feels like I have two simultaneous careers. My “day career” is in community radio, my “night career” is with my band The Belle Curves and playing bass in a handful of my friends’ projects. I find working in public media very fulfilling, I love the people I get to work with in the field, and it is adjacent to what I do as a musician but it isn’t drawing on the same creative sources so even if I’m tired at the end of a full work day, I don’t feel creatively drained the way I did when I was freelancing. Plus community radio and original music so clearly go hand-in-hand! It’s very symbiotic.
Having a “real job” (i say that sarcastically because what does that even mean??) has made it easier in a lot of ways to pursue my creative work. I’m incredibly lucky in that I get to work from home 90% of the time, which means I don’t have a commute, so late nights and evening rehearsals aren’t a problem. I can live quite cheaply and invest money into the music on promo, merch, etc, plus I even have health insurance!
My current day-job situation also gives me a lot of flexibility with my hours. As long as all the work is done in time and correctly, no one is breathing down my neck about what specific hours I work. I’m very grateful for where I’ve found myself.
All in all, having the financial stability and other resources of my day job has made me a much happier artist. Any “grinding” I do can be for the artistic vision. I don’t have to compromise the music in order to make money from it, and that works really well for me. I can’t overstate how grateful I am to have found work that is so compatible with my music-making. Sometimes I do think about what it would be like to have, what do they call it…. “free time” :) but what would i be doing in that free time any way? probably making music.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
It sounds cliche, but I genuinely cannot remember a time in my life when I wasn’t making music. I was singing before I could speak (i did have a speech delay but that just further proves my point!). I’ve been writing songs in some capacity since I was a kid, and I started taking it seriously with my first band in high school. I started my current project, The Belle Curves, in 2019. The Belle Curves started as a solo project but I quickly realized that I crave collaboration, and isn’t it so boring to have only one person’s influence on the music? like making a soup with one spice in it. So it’s become much more collaborative since the first album. I think of what I do in The Belle Curves as being a Star Trek captain (and I guess a regular captain but idk i only watch star trek). Ultimately I am the one making the decisions, but I have a team of people who are very talented and knowledgeable about what they do, whose opinions I trust, and who I rely on to help bring my vision to life. The Belle Curves’ sound has landed firmly in what I’d call indie-americana. We run the gamut from twangy alt-country and folk ballads to jangly power-pop and indie rock. Lush vocal harmonies, loud guitars, and a rock-solid rhythm section carry melodic, witty, and insightful songwriting.
I’m also a bass player. I play bass in The Belle Curves and I also play with Pete Mancini, Sarah Gross, Leland Sundries, and Finn & His Rustkickers. I’ve done some one-off recording sessions, and I’ve filled in for shows with lots of other talented friends of mine. I think I have a unique sensibility as a bass player to complement songwriter-oriented music. I strive to find a “pocket” with the great drummers I get to play with, and I love to sneak in counter-melodies and inversions when I think it’s right, but I never over play. I’m proud of my ability to learn songs by ear after one or two listens, but I also have no problem reading charts and talking theory. Plus, because I play bass and sing lead in my own band, I have no trouble singing complex harmonies while playing bass.
My dad (who is also my guitar player) and I have a home studio, and my college degree is in music production. I’m happy to work remotely with artists who need bass on their recordings and I can provide various options, such as the DI track along with a mic’d tube amp, and multiple variations of a part for them to pick and choose from. I think bass is often overlooked in the age of home recording. Home recording is an amazing thing, and there are many talented multi-instrumentalists who can play bass. But in my experience, producers tend to under-play on the bass. It’s sort of an after thought. On the other hand, guitarists who can also play bass seem to do the opposite, and over play. They play like guitarists, and don’t always have the feel and the “pocket” of a bass player. Finding bassists who fall between those two is important.
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
I love when I’m writing a new song or working on a new recording and it’s all I want to listen to. I joke about it, but my own songs are what I relate to the most. Obviously! And they are the combination of all my influences and all the music I’m listening to in that moment, so it’s very exciting when the new stuff is what I want to listen to. Ironically, by the time it comes out, I don’t really feel that way any more. But that’s normal and I’m okay with it. It’s new to the listeners, but I’ve moved on to a new set of songs by that time. It’s just the way it goes.
Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.
DIY level touring is hard to explain to people. The idea of taking time off of work, spending more money on gas and food than you make at the gigs, sleeping on floors and couches of strangers, driving hours on end for days in a row… why would someone do that?? The best analogy I’ve come up with is tent camping. Partly because I don’t like camping, but I understand why other people do. It’s just the joy of being out there. Why would I want to hike for hours to someplace where I could get hurt, bitten by bugs, being too hot or too cold, sleeping on the ground… why would someone do that?? Both come down to connection. With camping, it’s connection with yourself, with nature, and with the folks you go with. With DIY touring, it’s connection with strangers and music-lovers and your bandmates over your art. It’s just an indescribable joy. Those 45 minutes on stage each night make all the rest of it worthwhile. And eventually, hopefully, you work your way up into more comfortable and sustainable situations with tour managers, busses, hotels, etc. But in the beginning we just love the high of the connection and on-stage catharsis so much, we’re willing to do whatever it takes.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://thebellecurves.xyz/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/the.belle.curves/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/the.belle.curves
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/delaney-hafener-4b61a411a/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@the.belle.curves
- Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/4oh6tFTW9noCMnRqXOmSi4?si=dJ211K_nTb6XeD0mkMvaMw
Image Credits
Kelsey Sucena, Stanley Karwacki