Orion Sun: That Cosmic Thing

Orion’s meditative approach infuses her work with a distinct tenderness, now a signature to her soulful sound. As a fast accelerating alt R&B talent, garnering new fans and followers by the minute, Orion grapples with her online personality in an increasingly virtual world. Stubbornly viewing herself as a person and not as a brand, a thorny dissonance mounts between her life and social media activity. In this reality, an adoring fan quickly becomes a scorned heckler. Through the practice of boundary setting, Orion confronts Instagram with the same impersonal— yet innocuous—attitude of abstract curation and vintage aesthetics borne from her Tumblr days. Fans searching for incessant updates or thirsting for a peephole into her private life won’t find either. Her Instagram profile, a swath of muted tones and grainy pixels, presents like a dusty, leather photo album you might find in your grandmother’s attic. If her career was a Tumblr page, her music would match the sepia-toned graphics of her Instagram. 

ALESSANDRA SCHADE—Where are you Zooming from?

ORION SUN—I'm in Brooklyn right now, Crown Heights. New York by way of Philly. But I was raised in South Jersey. So, the Tri-State raised me. What do they say? It takes a village?

AS—Yeah, exactly. You've lived in so many places. Is there one spot that feels most like home to you?

OS—It's interesting, because I've been going to Philly recently because of band practice, and I'm driving through Jersey and my hometown. And even though I love the familiarity of driving through New Jersey and being like, Oh, I don't need the GPS, when I come to New York, I'm like, Okay, I'm back. So New York feels like home to me.

AS—Your music is a sanctuary for so many, in part, because your songs just emanate this warmth and intimacy. So, I'm curious how you foster that within your own life... Where do you find refuge? Is there a specific place where you can completely unwind and just let the day go?

OS—I would say my apartment. But even, like, my room in my family house back in the day always felt like my space and most like home to me. I realized that I could cultivate that space anywhere. I proved that to myself earlier this year. In February, for my birthday—I never really have parties—but I just wanted to get together with some friends because of the pandemic and with so much going on in my life. It was funny, like going on the second day even, that space started to feel like home because of what it was filled with and the energy that was there. So, it can be anywhere I really choose to settle.

AS—You're a nester.

OS—I don't know. Yeah, I guess. I hope that's, like, a chill thing?

AS—It's like a little bird taking all the nicest twigs to make their home! Especially during quarantine, we all needed that. How did that time impact your creative process?

OS—During the pandemic and coming off the Hold Space For Me projects, I was working on things but nothing was really coming. And that was okay, just to be makin' stuff, even though there was nothing I really wanted to share. I was just like, Damn, this is hard! So, I needed to get back to myself. Like, what do I like to do? So, I started going outside and doing a bunch of shit and it made me real- ize, even though I love making music by myself, I just really missed seeing people that I just banked on seeing, based on, you know, I'm working, you're working and we're bound to see each other. You know what I mean? When are we actually going to see each other now? So, I was like, I have to make this happen. It's a mix between, yeah, I want to work with a lot of the greats, but I also just want an excuse to...

AS—See your people!

OS—Yeah! So, things started to come together. And I realized that I love making music in this way. I just have this desire to be in every single aspect of my art. And I found working on Getaway that that is still possible, while also letting go of certain things, and letting other people really shine.

AS—I want to congratulate you on Getaway. Literally from the first track "intro”—it wins you over in seconds. Is there one song on Getaway that's your favorite?

OS—I think “intro” might be my baby. I produced that one and I got Yuli [Margaux Whitney] to do the strings on it. She's such a genius. I'm gonna pray that she can do one of the LA shows—or both—with me. I haven't really met a lot of people like her. I showed her what I had chopped up maybe twice, and she just went in there and to this day, I'm still just like, Girl what the fuck? And the bass, oh my god! Everything really came together. I think that was my baby also because I had second guessed it, which is really funny in retrospect. You know how it feels when you overthink and then you start doubting yourself and then you just have to be like, Well, I remember a version of me that really liked it.

AS—What's the origin of the name Orion Sun?

OS—I've always been into astrology. I still remember my first experience with stars—I must have been in first or second grade. In the library there was this great big dome, and we just crawled in and oh my god, you're so small. A lot of my school projects were on astronaut Mae Jemison and stuff. I was so hellbent on going beyond the sky. So, fast forward to when I was trying to figure out my name. Life is a hunt to me. Everything in this creative process is like, Okay, do I have the best gear? Do I have the best wardrobe for this execution of this hunt? Do I have what I need? Do I have what I need mentally? So, I wanted to call myself a hunter, and not in an American sense—more primal, raw. I'm digging and trying to search—sonically, emotionally. And I get confirmation every time the night is clear and I can look up at the sky and see that constellation. That has helped me so many times when I wanted to give up, so I was like, This is my name. And then the sun part came in at a more insecure time and just feeling like Wow, I have the best relation- ships when I'm at a distance. If the Sun were any closer, we would die. But it's close enough where we can still feel it and get nutrients. We know it's there. And that's kindof how I view myself on social media, like, it can't get any closer than this, I'm sorry. I feel like a lot of my support- ers respect that and know that about me, and know that I give as much as I can in other aspects.

AS—I love its androgyny too.

OS—Thank you. I never really felt all the way femme. I mean, looking back there's definitely pictures of me doing ballet and like, in dresses. I actually remember feeling really light and pretty in dresses. But at the end of the day, I really just love pants. And I was like how can I wear pants in all the settings?

AS—Your music feels very unabashedly you. Was it always easy for you to embrace who you are?

OS—I love this question because I had to think about it recently. From the jump, ever since I can remember, I liked being myself. I remember one time I strayed away from that when everybody was wearing Hollister, and I was just like, Mom, please, I know we don't got money but, fuck, I need this! And I was one of the chubbier kids so my mom ended up getting one of the pink Hollister shirts, but from the guy's side. But I feel like the clothes are super gendered.

AS—Yeah, they definitely fit differently.

OS—Yeah, so I was like, Maybe no one will notice, and when I went to school, somebody was like, Oh, my brother has that shirt LOL. And I felt so bad. I literally only wore it once. I think my mom had spent eighty dollars on this one shirt. And I learned from that experience, that I just don't care. I don't care and it doesn't matter. No matter what you do, somebody's not gonna like it. So, I just felt the safest in my own world and in cultivating my own space. And the power of, if I decide this thing is cool and I really stand on that, then that could be cool. So, I just ran with that. And I think the next hurdle for me was my queer identity and what does this all mean? How do I feel about it? Based on how I grew up, like, are we good with this? Talking to myself. That was another thing that once I got over, I was like, Okay, I'm back, I'm me. Whenever I have doubts, I sort of just go back to little me. Maybe it's my Aquarius jumping out, but I'm always gravitating towards things that I haven't seen before and are teach- ing me something new. I sort of live in that space.

AS—Do you think your identity informs your music? And do you want it to? Or do you just want people to listen to your music and take it at face value?

OS—You know, I hope this is not a cop out, but I'm hoping both. Because on one end, it's really awesome to just connect with someone purely on sonics. Funny story, [creator/actress] Quinta [Brunson]—shoutout Abbott Elementary—she reached out to me via DM. And she didn't know that I was from the Philly area. And she was like, ‘Yooo!’ And I was like, ‘Yooo!’ And she was like, ‘I wanted to finally see what you look like because I've been listening to your stuff non-stop.’ And it's cool that I look how I look, from where I come from, and have the identity that I do. But I also thought that it was cool that she was rocking with me before she saw me. So, I appre- ciate both. I just want to connect. If I have to share my music to sustain a living because I have to make art and I can't really do anything else, then I want to connect with as many people as possible. Even if I get hate, that's a connection to me. To me, indifference is my biggest fear. That's when I feel like I'm doing something wrong. But anything else, I'm like, Hell yeah. The human experience is one of my biggest muses, and so when we can connect on that, on that level, it just makes everything worth it.

AS—You mentioned that you like to keep a distance on social media. So, I’m curious... What are your thoughts on social media and the prevalence of TikTok as a plat- form for emerging artists?

OS—Growing up, my mom was really strict. So, by the time I got to MySpace, everybody's bio was like, ‘I moved to Facebook.’ I was like, Damn, that sucks! MySpace really gave me the bug on cultivating my own little space online. So, by the time I found Tumblr, the rest was history.

AS—You were a Tumblr girl?

OS—Oh, I was a Tumblr girl! But like, I was not on the cool side of Tumblr with the hair and stuff. I was on the writ- ing side... But, Tumblr, before they got bought out by Yahoo, was my favorite space on the internet—hands down—before I found SoundCloud. It was just so cool. I still have some friends to this day—like one of my friends from Tumblr came to my test listening party that I had, which was like a weird collision of worlds. With that being said, I love social media to a certain extent. Moving into being a brand, and an artist or influencer type person, that's where I don't really have the best relationship, only because I view myself as a person. And I view myself with reasonable boundaries. For example, sometimes I view things as, if I get a message, it's kind of like getting a letter. So, I can kind of take my time. But with social media, when it comes to messages, it can get a little intense because people get mad at you and have these unrealistic expectations and entitlement that I have no desire in, like, diminishing, but also I just don't want to be a part of it. It's weird.

AS—How do you handle that?

OS—The whole content versus art debate is real to me. I have conversations with my little brother all the time and I always tell him, ‘Make sure you have something outside of social media.’ I always think about how many great artists we're losing in this era due to content. But I also think that great art will always come around. Social media has highlighted some really mid art, really bad art, but some really awesome art, too. And I would be really fake to sit here and not be grateful for it. I mean, SoundCloud is one of my favorite sites and it gave me an idea of how I wanted to live online. And really, online is kind of like New York, right? A lot of people move to New York, and they're like, Oh, God, I feel like I have to do everything.

AS—It can also feel lonely in the sea of content and options.

OS—Exactly, and that's why you need a little community.

AS—What’s your community like? How would you describe your fans?

OS—Creatives. Artists whether they know it or not. They care about nature, care about self-love and self-care. Based on comments and stuff that I read, they’re also emotionally intelligent or just, like, striving to figure out why we feel how we feel. And it's okay that we feel so much or not at all. I think my fans, including me, ‘cause I'm a fan, we're just like inquisitive and open to life, the good and the bad. And I view them like that, ‘cause I view myself like that. And I think that's why we connect so much—because we're on this quest, we really are hunt - ing, and trying to figure out what's gonna work, if we have to be here.

AS—Right, we're here whether we like it or not.

OS—We might as well have fun. Might as well live. Might as well tell the tale. No matter how small your life story is, tell somebody—you never know. I get so shocked when - ever I throw in this minute detail, and I'm like, No one will care, it doesn't matter, this is for me. And then someone will literally be like, Is this my life?

AS—Are there certain songs that you are writing to your fans? Or if not, who are you writing to?

OS—It's really just to keep me sane and to process. I didn't realize that until I started putting my projects up and looking at them. For example, Getaway was written while I was in a relationship. But as I listened to it, it really details how I was feeling during the relationship which ultimately led to the breakup. So, that happens to me, where I'm writing in the moment, it feels light, it feels great. But at the end of the day, at the core of it, it's like, Wow, I wish I was listening to myself in this moment. Not thinking that it was for someone else was a huge sign for me. A huge just like, Hey, you're not happy, something has to change.

AS—How does the Getaway project compare with your other work? How does it fit into your evolution as an artist?

OS—I think outside of the collaboration aspect, I'm getting more concise. A Collection of Fleeting Moments and Daydreams—it was more of just throwing paint at the wall. But also, just like, I'm drowning, I need sanity and art is helping. I was working two jobs. So, it was more chaotic in that way. Hold Space For Me, this was my whole job. This was everything. Sometimes when I hear it, I can hear myself thinking, because I remember just being so nervous to even be in a studio setting. With Getaway, I'm the most free I've been. Looking at some of the footage taken at some of the sessions, like, I'm an extroverted person, but I'm also pretty shy. Yeah, we were like drinkin’ and chillin’, but I did open up in this way that I feel is representative of just how open I feel, in general, as an artist. I actually feel like a professional. Instead of walking in fear, I have self efficacy running through me—I can defi - nitely do this. Now it's, How am I gonna do it? What instruments am I gonna use? It's more fun. I just feel more... I don't want to say more professional but—

AS—More confident.

OS—Yeah, I like that. More confident. Even working around Ableton and things like that. Getaway is this springboard going into my next album, with what I know, with who I know... So now, what are we gonna do?