Earlier this year, Nebraskan native Emily Kinney was just as puzzled as her most devout fans in learning that a song of hers was pulled off of all streaming platforms. Released in December 2014 as a one-off single, “Rockstar” is a melodic list of vows to Kinney’s future husband, a man of both hers and the world’s stage. Through catchy verses and sexy Facetime calls, she builds a life for them in Downtown Los Angeles. She promises to grow old and loud with him, living the rockstar lifestyle until death do they part. However, after six years of heartbreak, that fantasy is no longer the dream that Emily has in mind. She jokingly told a fan that she’s not going to marry a rockstar, she’s going to become one. This mentality is carried through Emily’s fourth and most cohesive studio album, The Supporting Character.
From Omaha to Los Angeles, Greenpoint Avenue in Brooklyn, and back, Kinney takes her audience of shiny people on a journey of individuality. Across nine tracks, she discovers her self-worth in a lackluster town she once called home and waters her aspirations with the tears of an agonizing breakup. She voices her battle with body dysmorphia, embraces the traits that she and her sisters inherited from their mother, and in a vulnerable piano ballad, she confronts the five stages of grief. This record perfectly encapsulates the spiritual, emotional, and musical growth that Emily has experienced since the release of her previous album Oh, Jonathan in 2018, and ensures us that her dream of becoming a rockstar is not only tangible but a reality.
Opening with “Omaha Hotel,” Kinney sets the tone for The Supporting Character with a bubbly piano riff, a warm acoustic guitar sound, and the promise to herself not to let her dreams die. She reflects on visiting her hometown in Omaha, Nebraska for her uncle’s funeral and the uneasy feeling that she no longer belongs there. As she’s grieving the loss of a loved one, she acknowledges the loss of her childhood and the happy memories she missed when moving away. Her dream of becoming a musician and an actress burns so brightly that she feels no regret in leaving a place that is in more ways than one dying. Instrumentally, this track captures the sound that she developed in her last album, but quickly evolves in track two, “When The Midnight Fireworks Start.”
This song starts with Emily’s iconic mellow vibe, but transitions into a fuller sound as she adds in drums, an electric guitar, and a bass. For fans who have seen Emily in concert, this newer sound is reminiscent of her live performances. “When The Midnight Fireworks Start” introduces a confident and ambitious Emily as she proclaims her path to fame. Like the slow streak of smoke that a firework etches across the night sky before finally exploding in a fiery display of twinkling light, Emily is a slow burn ready for the oohs and ahhs of her crowd. Her dream of broadening her music career outshines all other aspects of her life, including heartbreak and loss, but of course, it doesn’t overshadow love.
As the very first single from The Supporting Character, “Easy” returns Kinney to her stripped-down roots and voices her work ethic. During her live-stream performance of this album at Hotel Cafe on April 2, she explained that her managers have always commented on how pliable she is as an artist because she goes with the flow and will happily show up wherever she is needed. The same is true in her relationships. Throughout this track, Emily confesses that she will put all of her energy into love and will even travel to be with a lover so it’s easier for him to love her back. In the second verse, she admits to giving all of her love to a man who only hurts and lies to her:
Oh, I am easy, always the same
I never whisper your perfect name
I cover scratches left on my chin
I wash your smoke smells from my white skin
And in my stomach are butterflies
I calm their flutter with your little white lies
Because of the repeated heartache and wearing of her faith in love thin, Emily has learned to set boundaries and prioritize her needs. She demonstrates her improvement in “Cadillac,” where she addresses the cage of fame that she was once trapped in. As her relationship that used to glimmer a bright red starts to simmer out, she begins to realize that she is a gravitational pull for damaged men. This one in particular is in a downward spiral as he’s toeing the edge of his invisible cage, and in the whirlwind of fame, he crosses the line and breaks Emily’s trust. When she would normally be easy and forgiving, she severs ties with him and moves on, which further enforces her self-indulgence.
TW: body dysmorphia, eating disorder, intrusive thoughts
The contrast between the instrumental track and the lyrics in her fifth track “Skinny” is what makes it the album’s stand-out piece. A smooth, floaty electric guitar and bass combination drives the melody for a majority of the song, but the addition of drums and a rougher guitar in the bridge gives the track a gritty, but well-rounded sound. As Kinney croons about wanting to shrink and disappear into her bones, the band soars over her spiraling thoughts and drowns them out. This is the musical illustration of what it feels like to be overcome by the obsessive thoughts that come with body dysmorphia.
During Emily’s album listening party on April 10, she revealed that the story behind “Skinny” came from a night when she had just moved to Los Angeles and she stepped on the scale to discover she had gained five pounds:
“The fact that I let it ruin my night…it kind of percolated in my head and I felt really exhausted by the idea of trying to lose five pounds, so I started to wonder if I cared or if it was just programmed into my head. Of course, I want to be healthy and my best self, but the control aspect of needing to be so perfect…I wondered if it was my voice or something that I’ve been told over and over again.”
Emily divulged that inspiration also came from societal views in the media and that she is directly affected by it as a result of her career:
“There’s always this constant message of self-improvement, physically, for women in magazines and television. Also, I’m an actress, so I’m constantly looking at myself on camera, being on stage, feeling like I need to be extra perfect in a way. So, those things definitely contributed to it.”
To lighten the mood, the buoyant summer track “Genetic Makeup” follows. Emily tackles the fact that she is exactly like the women in her family and she attributes it to her genetics. She correlates being prone to sunburns to the way she easily forgives but never forgets, which are traits that she picked up from her mother. With the opening verse, Emily describes the way that her mother continues to love people long after they’ve passed.
My mother memorizes
The dates of those who have died
She visualizes the numbers
Buries ‘em deep inside
Somewhere close to her heart
And when it’s been a few years
She digs up all the memories
Waters ‘em with her tears
Just like her mother, Emily admits in the chorus that when she loves someone, it’s forever. She confirms her theory of inheriting this eternal love in the second verse where she sings an anecdote about her sister giving her whole heart into an unbalanced relationship. It’s appropriate that this track precedes Kinney’s elegy for her on-screen father, Scott Wilson, because “I Went Looking For You” immortalizes his memory and the love she feels for him forever.
The album’s seventh song begins with a gentle piano that is a little reminiscent of Ellie’s theme from Up (2009). Benjamin Greenspan (producer) told fans during the listening party that Emily played the main piano part; but Adam Popick improvised over the track twice, giving depth to a special song. Emily expanded on this and added that for her Hotel Cafe performance, her keyboardist Misty Boyce was able to do her interpretation of the song, which leaves this track open-ended for future performances.
“I Went Looking For You” illustrates the five stages of grief in four minutes. Kinney wades through denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally, acceptance as a musing guitar joins the mesh of piano parts. The passing of her friend doesn’t feel real to Emily even as she’s arriving at his funeral. Her voice is delicate, but solemn as she looks for signs of his presence only to find proof that he’s truly gone.
I thought I felt you when the sun was burning my skin
As I climbed the stairs to handshakes and embraces
I thought I saw you in the screens, or heard you in the speeches
Or maybe in the tears running down your best friends’ faces
Questions pour angrily from Emily’s mouth to God in the chorus as she tries to understand how such a wonderful man could disappear from her life so suddenly. As the chorus resolves, she begins negotiating with her sorrow to better understand his passing.
And though you’ve lived such a beautiful life
It doesn’t seem fair
When I went looking for you, my friend
You weren’t there
At the funeral reception, as whiskey shots and memorial handouts are passed around, Emily is reminded that when we love and lose people, the world never really goes back to normal. She hints at feeling pummeled by life as it wears down her spirit and happiness.
We all kept our composure
Though the world would
Never, ever be the same
In this life, the hits keep coming
Oh, our bodies wear and tear
Acceptance of Scott’s passing comes instrumentally as the guitar accompaniment, initially heard following the first chorus and before being abruptly interrupted by her grief (the piano) in the second verse. Acceptance is then reintroduced at the end of the song as it and grief unite to fill the void left behind by Emily’s surrendering “you weren’t there.” The guitar drops off first as the piano eases to a pensive close.
As Emily re-enters her career-driven mindset, we are given the album’s title track, “The Supporting Character.” This song mirrors “When The Midnight Fireworks Start” in theme but focuses on her acting career rather than her music, and in resembling “Easy,” the lyrics pose a double meaning. A breakup unfolds in the beginning verse and chorus as Emily leaves her lover behind and drives back to LA alone, thus casting herself as the lead character in her personal story again. Hardcore fans will remember this sentiment from “Dad Says” (Expired Love, 2014) with the line, “But I never dreamed of second place, so I’d rather just quit than continue to race.”
Time starts moving quickly for Kinney as she streamlines her energy toward her acting career and takes every single minor role she can until it’s been over a year, and when looking back, she realizes how small of a role this man and her heartbreak played in her life. Now she’s starting to understand that she doesn’t always have the right answers and she won’t always have strength in the same places that she once had. Even at the young age of 35, she is still learning about herself and growing from her experiences.
That growth is exhibited one more time in the concluding song, “Fifteen Minutes.” While a bulk of this record is about Emily expanding her career to a larger audience, she has already experienced the struggles of dealing closely with fame. From a quiet hotel room with a bottle of champagne to herself, she reveals just how lonely being a star can be and she no longer wants that kind of life. She would trade her fifteen minutes of fame for a steady relationship, and maybe even a family someday.
Emily Kinney spilled to fans during her listening party that she is working on and finishing up another album and is in the process of publishing her very first poetry book. Follow her on Instagram and Twitter so you don’t miss out on her next releases!
