We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Maria Blair. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Maria below.

Maria, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. How did you learn to do what you do? Knowing what you know now, what could you have done to speed up your learning process? What skills do you think were most essential? What obstacles stood in the way of learning more?

As of right now with Split Intentions, all four of us are learning everyday. I think in our world (Hardcore), you have to be in order to make what you’re doing matter. A lot of it is learning from others who are older and smarter than you and learning from those who have been in your local scene for a while.

As far as speeding up our learning process, I think us having more patience would have helped us in the long run. We were ready to share our music and our art with the world, but can easily forget it may not be received as quickly as we wanted it to be. It’s kind of a wild transition to practicing months and months in the confines of your own space to then sharing it with a room full of others.

The skill I think that is most important is consistency. Whether it be practice, going to other local shows, or how we play live.

I think sometime we stood in our own way. At the beginning of this project we were easily disappointed because we were putting our validation on others. Now we go out and we play for each other, we want to sound good for each other, and if people happen to dance, mosh or whatever, then that is just a cool bonus.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I am the vocalist for the band and since I was 14 I knew that is what I wanted to do. I am now almost 28, so it only took 14 years for everything to fall into place. I have pretty much always been into “Heavy” music, however I discovered hardcore in the past 2 years and it has completely taken over my life in all the best ways. As far as my bandmates go, I cannot speak on behalf of them, but they too are also very passionate about hardcore. Our bassist John lives and breathes it and I am learning new stuff from him all the time. Regarding how we actually made this happen, it started with me and our drummer, Curtis. Our first time meeting in person we planned to meet with a guitarist and he bailed on us, but at this point in my life I was determined to get something started so I went over to meet him anyways and we recorded his drums, he played guitar and I screamed over it.. It was not necessarily “pretty”. From there we recruited our guitarist Cody, wrote some stuff, tried out some other bassist and finally landed on our current bassist, John.

We are a hardcore band. We love the underground DIY scene and are heavily involved in it in the Louisville area. As far as hardcore music goes one of my favorite quotes is “Hardcore is for anyone, but not for everyone”, so do with that what you will.

I think what sets us apart is our sound, we all have different backgrounds in music and in taste and Split intentions is just a mix of all of that. Another thing would be passion. For the most part if you are in hardcore, you have to be passionate. It is not about money, it is not about clout, it is not about anything other than your individualized expression and being apart of the counter culture, being with others like yourself.

I would want future fans to know that we are just every day people, we all have day jobs, we all have our own individualized struggles and we make our music to be heard and to be felt. If there is something you can relate to in the lyrics of our songs, we want you to come rip the microphone out of my hand and sing your guts out with us.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

Check out your local scene. For the most part the city of Louisville has just about every music scene you can imagine. You may not be into hardcore, but there is punk, rap, metal, country and so much more. Don’t be scared to try something new and go to a local show of whatever you are into. These artist’s that sell millions of tickets each year do not care about you, but your local musician will.

Specific to the hardcore scene: 1. GO TO SHOWS. I cannot emphasize that enough. Even shows that you may not recognize any of the local or regional bands, go anyways. You never know when you will discover the next favorite band. 2. Buy merch especially for touring and traveling bands. 3. Start your own hardcore band. If you are passionate about hardcore and go to other local shows and support other local/regional bands, there will be a space for you once you are ready to share your craft. 4. The last one I would say is look into your regional bands. For us in Louisville we collaborate with a lot of different Midwest bands and we want to bring more people and bands to our city. There is no better way to show them love for Louisville Locals to show up and show out for them.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

Our goal at the end of the day is to make music. We want to be able to be able to share our music with the world. We plan to make this dream a reality by starting our first mini tour this November up and around the Midwest. I think 2025 will be a big year for us and you should hop into our journey with us to see what all we are going to tackle and do in the next year.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/splitintentions/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCetUjtHQJ9wJzfI7dUlSWcQ
• Other: Check out Split Intentions on Spotify and Apple music.

Image Credits

Mat Schladen