London singer-songwriter montana chanel is embracing vulnerability on her latest single, “ride or die” – an emotionally charged alternative pop track about the conflict between following your heart and listening to your head. Written in the aftermath of a near-breakup with her now ex-boyfriend, the song captures the messy reality of love, heartbreak, self-reflection and recognising unhealthy patterns, all wrapped in a catchy, melodic sound.
With its shift between minor verses and major choruses, “ride or die” mirrors the push and pull at the heart of the song, while its infectious melody marks a new direction for montana as she continues to shape her identity as an alternative pop artist. In this interview, she opens up about turning intense emotions into music, the complicated relationship between self-awareness and change, and why songwriting has been such an important outlet throughout her mental health journey. She also discusses her early experiences as a performer and voice actor, including voicing Pocoyo, her plans to explore everything from dance and drum and bass to rock and rap, and the advice she would give to anyone questioning whether a relationship is worth fighting for.
LOCK: “ride or die” feels like a very honest snapshot of being caught between your heart and your head. When did you realise this particular experience needed to become a song?
montana: I write music as a form of therapy to process my emotions as I struggle with mental health issues. After an extreme argument with my now ex-boyfriend, my emotions were so intense that I needed to have an outlet and channel that energy into something productive, so I decided to write how I felt and turn it into something to distract myself. I was so caught up in my own head I couldn’t tell if having to even write this song was a sign to break up or not. While sitting there sobbing into my ukulele I just kept strumming and figuring out chords and eventually wrote it in an hour! I always write during important moments to try and help me process/function after something has happened.
LOCK: There’s a real sense of push and pull throughout the track, not just in the lyrics but in the way the music moves between major and minor. How did you translate all of those conflicting emotions into the sound of the song?
montana: I’m glad you noticed that, it was intentional! I wanted to portray how conflicted I felt as much as I could sonically and lyrically, but also in a subliminal way whereas a casual listener with no music knowledge you feel like you’re being kind of pushed back and forth in a listening experience, really pushing the staying or going feeling that was going on in my head. I switched from minor chords in the verses to major chords for the chorus to add to that, and I used a lot of repetition in the lyrics to kind of add to that. And regarding the lyrics, I feel like the repetition just helps to visualise a mental pacing back and forth of “you’re just making me cry all the time; are you the one for me or are you just going to keep hurting me because I will do anything to make it work”.
LOCK: You’ve described the song as an inner narrative about recognising patterns and being drawn towards what feels familiar, even when it isn’t necessarily healthy. Was writing “ride or die” a moment of clarity for you, or were you still figuring things out as you wrote it?
montana: To be quite honest, it wasn’t the wake-up call that I needed and as you can see through the lyrics I was still very much trying my absolute hardest for it to work – in spite of everything – and I feel like I opened my eyes a little for sure and took the wool away from them and started actually saying “hey you can’t treat me like this” and realising this behaviour isn’t acceptable. But I still stayed, so I guess it didn’t work just yet!
I think it definitely played on my mind a lot, and I started working on it with my producer a few months after writing it while me and my ex were still together and just hearing my own words really played on my mind while constantly recording vocals and everything. I wish I could say it opened my eyes and was finally my last straw, but I’m flawed, human and extremely codependent so unfortunately – not enough.
LOCK: The lines “Part of me will always be an addict to chaos and lows / It’s what I call home” really stand out. What does that idea of chaos feeling familiar mean to you, and has writing about it changed the way you see those patterns in yourself?
montana: It was an extremely vulnerable line to write and admit to myself like “hey montana you’ve got a problem but at least you’re self-aware!” Unfortunately, I’ve never been in a healthy relationship, and my first proper relationship was extremely abusive and toxic and resulted in me getting a complex PTSD diagnosis. It definitely shaped what I allowed myself to go through following that, and to allow my following boyfriends to hurt me. I didn’t heal nor recover, and the cycle just kept repeating in many ways and many different forms in my personal life where unless everything is hectic, I don’t feel stable and unfortunately chaos feels familiar. I tend to always go for the wrong boy that really isn’t that different to the last one, and do risky stupid things because when life is “normal” it feels wrong. My nervous system is absolutely broken! I’ve always been extremely self-aware, so I know what I do and why I do it. I just wish I could listen to my own advice sometimes.
LOCK: You’ve been open about your mental health journey. Do you find that writing about difficult experiences helps you make sense of what you’re going through, and has that changed the way you approach songwriting?
montana: Writing music has been a form of therapy for me since I was around 13, and being able to channel those impossible feelings – usually negative – into something productive and positive just helps to snap me out of the unbearable weight of the emotions I can feel at that point in time and focus on something in the moment. It has helped me have some peace in the moment and maybe helped me to see that a situation is not healthy, or help me reflect on it, but I’m not going to lie and say it changed my mind at that point in time and most of the time I needed a while longer to reach that decision myself.
It definitely has a massive impact on my writing as I mostly write my best from emotion and extremely strong emotions so most of my songs are extremely raw and vulnerable, and I just see them as a positive outlet for how I feel at that point in time that I can now work on as a project. It genuinely is like a snapshot of my mental health and psyche at that current moment. Sometimes it makes me sad to see some of the things I wrote in a really bad place.
LOCK: Although the subject matter is heavy, “ride or die” has an infectious, almost uplifting quality to it. How important was it for you to find that balance between vulnerability and something people could actually sing along to?
montana: I completely agree. I shifted my sound from this song into a more pop structured catchy song from my previous work, and it was on purpose. I wanted to make a shift in my sound to appeal to everyone while still sounding authentic to myself, which will always include that vulnerability and haunting lyrics behind a catchier melody but balancing it to sound like way more of a bop than a skip on your playlist!
I’ve always wanted to make catchier songs but always struggled with the chorus, but with “ride or die” I poured my heart out at 2am and had this crazy melody come into my head, and it just flowed extremely catchy but it was all written in one go and felt extremely authentic to me while having that one thing I’ve been missing which is songs that people will remember the lyrics to and sing back to me in future shows. That balance is super important because I am more alternative pop in a genre, but I also wanted a melodic song that still felt like me.
LOCK: This single feels like another step in shaping your identity as an alternative pop artist. What are you discovering about yourself creatively as you continue to grow into that sound? Are there any other sounds you want to explore?
montana: I feel like this song is the beginning of a massive shift. I still want to sound like me but a lot more uptempo and catchier. I’ve noticed that all of my friends that heard the song pre-release were all saying it’s my best work and I’d asked for constructive feedback, and I’ve really seen how everyone has reacted to it with such love and I’ll be shaping my songs differently from now on. It’s definitely changed my personal structure on my songs I’ve noticed since I’ve been writing more.
I actually have so many sounds I want to explore later down the line! I have big plans for future albums; I’d love a few tracks with a D&B/dance/club sound to them with heavy synths and strong harmonic vocals, a more heavy rock sound as a collaboration, rap collaborations etc. As so many of my favourite artists are from completely different genres and my taste is very versatile, I’d love to at least have a couple of songs with very different sounds – all 5 of my songs sound very different. So many ideas that come to my mind with melodies but for now definitely more pop focused.
LOCK: You started performing and working in voice acting from a very young age, including being the voice of Pocoyo. Looking back, how do you think growing up in that world shaped the artist and storyteller you’ve become today?
montana: Yes I did! I absolutely adored the performing arts world and growing up I always felt in every single one of my atoms that I was meant for it. I loved acting, dancing and singing and even in primary school just always felt like it was my calling. I’ve always been able to do any accent on command so voiceovers and voice acting have always felt like fun, never a chore to me. Pocoyo was definitely something that shaped me for life and made me feel like being in front of my microphone is what I was born to do. I’d struggled a lot with my chronic anxiety since childhood and unfortunately messed up a lot of chances in that world, but I always loved going to auditions for roles since a child and felt like being a creative was definitely always going to be for me.
LOCK: If someone listening to “ride or die” is currently stuck in that same space of wondering whether to stay, fight or finally let go, what do you hope they take away from the song?
montana: I would give them one piece of advice right now – if you’re ever doubting if this is meant for you and you don’t know if you should stay or go, always listen to what’s telling you to leave without your emotions in the way as you’re probably clouding your own judgment with your feelings rather than thinking about what is making you feel like you want to leave in the first place.
Us human beings have a habit of prolonging our own pain. Always remember to put yourself first and take care of yourself, and if your gut is ever telling you that you need to leave, listen to it and stop excusing things you would tell your best friend to leave over!
“ride or die” is out now via Now Listen.