By Daniel Warren Hill
A Nashville native now residing in Los Angeles, Stevie Howie broke onto the music scene in fall 2021 with his unique rendition of Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” The success of this track, the response from fans, and Howie leaning into his artistic intuition fueled the reception of his original music single debut, “shakes,” released December that same year. “shakes” is a song that covers comprehensive territory, revealing Howie’s various influences by artists like Fleetwood Mac, John Mayer, and Paramore, as well as his desire to bring his love of classical, rock, R&B, blues, and pop together under one roof.
The fan response continues to reflect the talent Howie presents in his latest release “stalker,” a darker more industrial track, think Stabbing Westward, that is incapable of hiding Howie’s love of that 90s grunge guitar sound. The lyrical content is a little more mature as well.
“O baby are you out / Can I find you downtown / Don’t know what to do without / Am I creeping you out / Don’t know what to do without,” he sings.
There seems to be quite a bit of concern that the recipient of the unwelcome attention might be with someone else, and the track describes a graphic situation that some may find uneasy, and that some may even have personal experience in. However, in Howie’s case, it appears to be an exploration of the mind, or how far some are willing to go beyond what is socially acceptable.
“I wrote ‘stalker’ because I kept fixating on the most tactile version of missing someone. Obviously, missing someone is always a painful experience, but there’s a deeper level of despair that occurs when you can’t stop thinking about what they are literally doing right now. When not tempered by logic, that kind of thinking spirals into obsession, and of course, stalking,” says Howie.
It remains to be seen if fans can expect Stevie Howie to dwell in darkness in future releases, or if he is just stretching his creative wings in a lot of different directions to highlight his versatility. Hear “stalker” below or find it on our Alchemical Records Multigenre Mixture playlist on Spotify.
Daniel Warren Hill is an American musician, writer, and motivational speaker. He is best known as the frontman for Washington DC area Alternative Rock band YellowTieGuy, as co-founder of Capitol Groove Collective, and increasing the exposure of artists on a global scale through his work with Alchemical Records.
After AFI DOCS’s departure, the capital city once again has a documentary festival.
Alchemical Records is a Washington, D.C. based music publication. We cover the Washington, D.C., Baltimore and Richmond, VA metro area music scenes, including band interviews, articles about your favorite musicians, new music and concert dates.
