ALEX RAY UNLEASHES SEDUCTIVE NEW SINGLE “DRIVERS SIDE” — A DARK, HYPNOTIC CONFESSION OF LOVE, LUST & LIES

From the story behind Drivers Side, to when her interest in music sparked, an in-depth interview with Alex Ray, sharing her experience of the journey to becoming an artist and finding her sound.

Cover art for Alex Ray's new song, "Drivers Side" Photo credit to Shantell Cruz.

Interviewer : First, just tell me a little bit about yourself and your music.

Alex : I'm Alex Ray. I'm from a very small town in Kentucky. I grew up very, I'd call it sheltered, in a very Christian family. Didn't really get a lot of exposure to different kinds of music. When I got into high school, I discovered all the bands of  the Warped Tour, Mayday Parade, Paramore, all the classics, and Hate Monday at some point before they broke up.

I started making music when I was young, got my first guitar when I was in middle school, and started writing music. Then when I was in my early 20s, I got away from it, went through a breakup, was broke in Nashville and decided to go to law school, which was an interesting decision. So, I ended up practicing law. Then the past year or so, I decided I wanted to do music again, that I was miserable and wanted to pursue music and making content and we were going to make it happen. So, that's where we're at.

I'd say about my music, I've been releasing songs for a couple years, but I really didn't commit to doing this for real and marketing my music and branding myself till about February, March. I think at this point, we really defined the sound. So, if you listen to an Alex Ray song going forward, starting with the last single, Boy You Ain't, going forward, it's going to be a mix of alt, pop rock, and a little bit of trap influence. We do a lot of trap percussion, some synth pop elements, and really just the artists that people know and love, like Charlotte Sands, Lolo, a little bit of Taylor Acorn on the more rock side, a little 5 Seconds of Summer in the genre of fluidity, things like that.

Interviewer : Is there anything that you strongly stand for in your music?

Alex : Yeah, I think the themes that I write about are a little bit of everything, obviously, like my love life or lack of it at certain times in my life, breakups, falling in love, things like that, but also I think the songs that are coming up in my latest project are really going to explore parts of ourselves and experiences that we're kind of too embarrassed to talk about. The really messy parts of ourselves, things that we struggle with, our vices, owning up to them. Are we even healing from them or are we being unhealthy and just observing those feelings?

In the future, there are going to be a lot of songs about mental health and how we view ourselves and sexuality, religion, and themes like that, some more deep themes that we've definitely got written and songs in the can. This first project is definitely going to be about all the experiences that we don't like to talk about and the things that, I would say, are vulnerable for me to talk about, not just easy.

Interviewer : What inspired you to write Drivers Side?

Alex : We committed to writing an EP this past winter going into spring. I went out to LA to spend a lot of time with my producer, John Sinclair of World's First Cinema and the artist Daddy, who I did a song called Snake Eyes with and my manager, Hannah. We just kind of holed up in the studio for two weeks, writing, recording, tracking. At one point, my producer, if I remember it correctly, came up with the na-na-na-na-na-na-na like the sound at the beginning of Driver's Side, and I was like, that's sick, let's do this. So we kind of fleshed out the track from there and the lyrics and the melody that you hear “what you say keep me laying in the back row’, that part was stuck in my head and I was like, what could this be about? Like I have no idea where this is even coming from. I really thought a lot about what relationships in my life were secret or what were these ‘cloak and dagger’ affairs that I've had.

My love life and my relationship history is tortured, to say the least, It is an absolute mess. So there was this relationship when I was 20 where I fell in love with this guy, it was definitely kind of this secret, he was coming off of another relationship, and we had a lot of mutual friends, and it was just very messy, and when it ended, it ended hard.

So, Driver's Side is really more about the facade that I put on at the beginning of that relationship, that I had it all together, I was hot, I knew it, he was going to want me, I was going to stop at nothing. Then you get towards the bridge of Driver's Side and you kind of hear like, wait, this is all front, she's actually feeling very insecure about this and she's kind of fallen in love. Then at the first part of the song, it really is, oh, she's like using him, oh, she gets what she wants, you know and then you hit the bridge and you're like, ooh, maybe there's more to this than it seems.

Interviewer : How does Driver's Side connect to you as a person? 

Alex : All of my songs are about my experiences. I have the inability to make things up, and I have lived a very interesting life, I would say, up to this point. There's been a lot of drama, a lot of different experiences, a lot of, I wouldn't go as far to say trauma, my therapist probably would say trauma, but I would say that's a little bit dramatic. So, I have a lot of experiences to pull from when I write music, and Driver's Side is just an example of that. I don't really make anything up in my songs, like even if we're in writing sessions and somebody pitches like, oh, just like put this line in here, it doesn't have to be relatable to you and I'm like, no, it does. Like I have this weird thing where it has to be my diary entry or nothing. I think all of my songs are very, very close to me because of that reason. It’s very Taylor Swift of me.

Interviewer: Are there any other directions you want to take in your future releases?

Alex : Yeah, I think there's a lot of songs that we have in the can or that I've written by myself that I want to explore and some of them are as they are right now, a little bit more ballady. We've not really got any slow songs or any, you know, anthemic ballads on this new project coming up but, I’m a sad song girly and I love writing a sad song and being sad about it. So, I think I would like to explore, you know, maybe some like rockish ballads, like trying to find some ground, like maybe the only exception or something like that that we could explore. Then definitely like theme-wise, I want to explore more mental health themes. I have bipolar, I'm super open about that on the internet and like those things have affected me a ton and I definitely want to write about them.

Interviewer : In your own perspective, how is it being an artist in 2025? What's some advice that you would give to someone wanting to join the industry?

Alex : Good question. I actually just talked about this in another interview yesterday. I think being an artist in 2025 is a very unique time to be in the industry. I don't think we've ever seen anything like it before. You know like, the internet rules, the long gone are the times of Taylor Swift walking into the Bluebird Cafe in Nashville and being discovered by Scott Bruschetta, you know, those things don't happen anymore, so really now labels want to know, or you even if you're going to stay indie, what needs to happen is you need to build a fan base on the internet. You need to play the shows, you need to get an opening spot, you have to do all that. So like, I think on one side, it's scary because you see how saturated the market is. It feels like everybody on the planet wants to be an artist, but on the other side, it gives people a chance that otherwise wouldn't have a chance. This is not self-deprecating either, I’m just very practical, but I'm not the prettiest person on the planet, I don't have the best voice on the planet, I'm not the most charismatic person on the planet. Prior to this internet age, a label would have been like, she's not the full package, she doesn't have a rich family member or like celebrity family member, we're not going to sign her.

Now I can find other ways that I add value because I am the product. My music is the product that I'm trying to sell to people, and I can make connections with people in other ways. You know, I think people now in the internet age, they don't want to see the perfect package unless it's Zara Larson who was like created in a lab in Nevada, you know, but like for me, the value I add is I'm just a normal person who makes music about my life experiences.

So, I'd say if you want to get into the industry, which I feel like I'm very on the fringe of, I wouldn't even call myself like in the industry yet, but I'm working on it. I would say just find the thing, find the story and the narrative that you would connect to if you were to be a fan of yourself. What I mean by that is there's an artist called Rin. I love him. He's very open about his health struggles and he's created this narrative, I'm not saying created  like he made it up, but the narrative that people relate to is that he's this indie artist, he's taking on the industry, he's making waves as an independent person who has a hand in all of his creative endeavors and he has overcome his physical and mental illnesses to do that. So, I'd say find the thing, find your story and give it to people. Just be vulnerable. Don't hide those parts of yourself because that's what people will relate to.

Interview conducted and transcribed by EJ Meredith