Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter and producer Frances Baker releases her latest EP, Isabella’s House.
Baker is a rising alternative R&B star who continues to experiment and push her sound with each release. On Isabella’s House, she moves from room to room, falling in love and daydreaming, her sultry vocals creating an ethereal atmosphere.
Exclusively with LOUD WOMEN, Baker reflects on the creative process behind building the foundation of Isabella’s House:
“Isabella’s House is a real place! It is a museum in Boston that I found myself going to constantly when I lived there. I was obsessed with its ridiculousness. It was evident it was a woman’s house. Colorful rooms bursting with paintings in funny places: over corners, hung above freestanding desks, stacked up to the ceiling. It’s full of religious artifacts, and perfect tiling! It was an escape at a time when I was completely riddled with shame, wanting to escape myself, and did not know what I could stand in.
Which brings me to the state of mind… I lost myself in Pinterest boards, art books, photo books, photography instagram accounts, museums, vintage shops, The Real Real and SSENCE window shopping doom scrolls. I walked down Boston streets and looked at engraved porch rails, bay windows, perfect silver jewelry engulfing moldavite and moonstone. I drove to the beach and I drove to Salem. I dreamed of a version of myself I could stretch out in. Where I could be confident and not cower so much in fear when met with any human interaction. One with enough room for me to relax. I had felt so cramped trying to bend into whatever I thought I was supposed to be at the moment. So I slowly let myself run completely in the direction I knew I needed to go. And while doing that, part of my dream was a project that I took time with, one that I really sat with and adjusted. I wrote about running away, I wrote about falling in love, I wrote about finding people I love and could run away with!! I also wrote about trying to accept all of myself. So really Isabella’s house became a sort of aspirational safe haven where I could be and accept myself and feel okay with the contradictions and uncertainties of being.”
With a clear creative vision, Baker’s personal aesthetic is within her music, especially in the world of Isabella’s House. Baker shares what fuels her creativity:
I just love visual stuff!! I grew up always thinking I would be an artist! I love painting and drawing and clothing and makeup. So one day I thought…. I shouldn’t divide myself so much! Instead of just making clothes or doing crazy makeup.. I should put it all together! I started having so much fun… I tried to imagine… if I had one second to introduce myself to someone… how can I try to tell them everything? I tried to boil everything down and find what my current absolute core was! I also look to my love of French films, Jane Birkin, the whole shibang. The Love Witch! And somehow also minimalism….. and trying to shrink my closet into the essentials! That started around the time I left college… and I think evolved into me wanting to make fun visuals! It just combines my love of art and music!
As far as music goes…. My dad is a 50’s baby and my mom 60’s so I always grew up listening to music from the 70’s! Funk! Soul! Rock! Rap! Folk! And so much Indie! I just love how warm some old songs are. I adore the crackling of vintage recordings and I just adore so many musicians. I typed out a list but it seems like a bit irrelevant ahaha. I just adore all kinds of things and have been jigsawing them together in a way I hope translates.”
Check out Isabella’s House here.
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