The nomadic life of a performer in a touring Broadway production isn't the easiest to manage. The combination of never feeling settled while often being away from the ones you love and while also trying to deliver a stellar performance of the same show again and again can be emotionally and vocally taxing on the actors. The spotlight may be invigorating and revitalizing, but for most performers, the last thing they want to do on days off is spend even more time on stage.
Given that, Brittany Campbell and Candace Quarrels are mythical outliers befitting their joint siren pseudonym. When the two aren't sharing the musical theater spotlight as part of the blockbuster musical Hamilton, they form the alternative R&B duo Mermaid. Boasting killer vocal harmonies (which might make listeners think they're sea witches who stole their angelic pipes from naive young lasses desperate for legs) and a knack for genre-blurring sonic exploration, Mermaid's creativity bubbles to the surface on the group's 2023 debut album Iridescence. One moment Mermaid dips its flippers into loving pop R&B grooves ("Thrivin'") and the next the group is off-kilter singing about societal ills ("Purr"). The duo feels just as comfortable rocking out in alternative ("Boundaries") and punk ("Disassociate") realms as it does with minimalist tender folk ("On a Cloud") and sensual indie psych-R&B ("Wanna Be Your Lover") sonic spaces.
"It's all over the place in a pretty deliberate sort of way," Campbell says. "In the industry, especially as Black artists, people try to pigeonhole you into a genre or packaging, and want to push against it because Black music is so many things. So we kind of wanted to go in with that knowledge and be brave and truthful about who we are and what we like without any sort of apprehension."
The couple not only pour their time away from the stage into their own music, they also tour as Mermaid while on tour with Hamilton. To that end, Campbell and Quarrels will play a Mermaid gig at The Big Dipper on Monday, April 14, smack dab in the middle of their two-week run (April 8-20) performing in Hamilton at the First Interstate Center for the Arts.
Hamilton is more than just a job for Campbell and Quarrels, as the pair initially met after landing roles in the 2017 Chicago production of the hit American history hip-hop musical. Cast to play two of the Schuyler sisters, the two pretty quickly hit it off musically.
"I'm super woo woo about it all, but it was immediately souls recognizing each other," Quarrels says. "Playing sisters was also so special, just hearing the blend of our voices and our chemistry together, both on stage and off it. We knew there was something special about our bond and our sound. And Britt has been making music for so long and is such an amazing solo artist, and one day she just asked me to sing background vocals for one of her shows in Chicago, and we had so much fun doing that. And yeah, I think the idea of us singing together really was brought to fruition via Brittany and her already having so much music in her brain and heart. It came together super organically."
"Apart from obviously singing in Hamilton, Candace and I would just be going around the theater outside, hanging out, just like harmonizing with each other," Campbell adds. "And our friends would be like, 'Oh my God, you guys! You sound like you have blood harmony!' I was always really intrigued by Candace's voice, so I think that also [led to] wanting to write and see what kind of music could come out of our similar tastes and our natural chemistry."
But while the musical bond was instant, the pair's relationship was a bit slower burning. In fact, music served another hidden purpose in the first year of Campbell and Quarrels knowing each other — it was also coy flirting.
"It took a minute for our friendship to really even form, and the sort of unspoken romance behind it to develop," Campbell says. "That's when the music started to come. I think it was sort of how we were communicating with each other before we were able to admit feelings for each other. And it just sort of became an outlet in that way."
By the end of 2018, the two were an item, and the following year they moved together to Los Angeles and started pouring a bit more focus into Mermaid. The biggest obstacle out of the gate was trying to figure out what their band should sound like because both brought such disparate musical passions to the table.
Mermaid had one song, "Find Me," a folky track that's part Moses Sumney and a whole lot of heart-melting vocals. The duo submitted a video of it as part of NPR's Tiny Desk Contest, and it was selected by Alabama Shakes' Brittany Howard as one her favorite of the submissions. But even with the positive attention, Mermaid didn't really feel like fully locking into that sound.
"As we decided to live our lives apart from the musical, just like learning about each other and learning about each other's musical tastes, we kind of decided to explore and not hold ourselves back. Not try to fit into any one genre, and just go with what was inspirational at the time," Campbell says. "In the beginning it was folk, and then in the middle there it turned into more like Anderson .Paak alternative R&B coded music. And then Candace got me a drum kit, and all of a sudden we were making more punk-leaning, indie-leaning music. So yeah, we just kind of went with what felt really good and what was exciting to us."
T he women of Mermaid will be the first to tell you that trying to be a band playing shows while also performing in a big Broadway production might not be the smartest move in terms of preventing mental and physical wear and tear, but having a creative outlet they can call their own makes up for the energy drain.
"It is definitely being in it," Quarrels says. "It's a lot, a lot of work. We do Mermaid shows on our day off. Hamilton is eight shows a week, and then adding a ninth one — normally the one night for performers without singing — it can be exhausting. But how special and how fed are we to get to spend a night of our week performing this music that means so much to us and is ours? We're getting new ears on it, inspiring our coworkers and inspiring ourselves. I know I always feel so good after a Mermaid show, because this means something to me, means something to us. We believe in this music, and it is worthy of this effort. It's a labor of love, but it's worth it."
The duo hopes to raise money to put together a second Mermaid album in the not-too-distant future, with new tunes drawing on everything from electronic hyper pop and Joni Mitchell to indie rock and instrumental jazz. It's these vibrant sonic seas where Mermaid feels most at home. Sure, the nightly standing ovations Campbell and Quarrels receive as part of the Hamilton cast can feel amazing, but its time on Mermaid's much more modest stages where the couple finds a deeper creative fulfillment.
"In Hamilton, we're playing pretty deep characters. We're telling a very specific story," Campbell explains. "But when we play our shows, it's just us on the stage, which feels super, super important and I think recharges us as artists. I know that I personally need to feel that sort of freedom, that sort of autonomy, that sort of inspiration that comes from sharing what is literally from our hearts, our souls."♦
Mermaid, Brittany Campbell, Yel, Prodsynesthete • Mon, April 14 at 7:30 pm • $15 • All ages • The Big Dipper • 171 S. Washington St. • thebigdipperspokane.com
