An Interview with Keith Baierley

By Ava Broussard 

Local Music Journalist 

“The goal is to sound as much as myself as I possibly can. The best thing about music is you’ll never get there because there’s always more.” 

Singer-songwriter Keith Baierley is an aspiring musician from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I was fascinated by his musical passion whilst getting to know him at our workplace. I decided to interview Baierley in hopes of probing his drive for songwriting. He moved to Austin originally to pursue his screenplay — having heard of Richard Linklater and the Coen brothers filming in Texas’s capital city— he decided to embark on a journey west. Although “It and I don’t talk at the moment”, Baierley states about his screenplay in progress. Fortunately for him, “it just so turns out that Austin is the live music capital of the world, so I figure, I’m already here, I might as well stick around here for a little bit,” and he did.  

How long have you been making music, and how did you start? 

“I was gifted my first guitar when I was 15. Um, I’m gonna date myself a bit here, that was 1995. So I’ve been playing guitar for however long that is, well, I started in 1996, I suppose. Almost 30 years.” 

Baierley’s inspiration stems first and foremost from The Beatles. “Once I heard The Beatles, I knew I needed to figure out how they did that.” His current inspiration is classical music. The influence stemmed from his mother showing him Tchaikovsky and other Russian composers from a young age, “It was one of the first things I ever listened to.” Baierley’s favorite current songwriter is Mitski, admiring her consistently solid songwriting.  

A unique way Baierley gathers inspiration is from paintings, writing the words that flow through his mind as he observes works from artists such as Salvador Dalí. “I was trying to write intentionally idiosyncratic sort of esoteric things where only I got it, I thought that was a cool thing, and thankfully, over time, I’ve tried to be more relatable.” With Dalí’s work already being surreal, it was perfect for his songwriting, in being able to write about things that make no sense.  

What’s a goal moving forward?  

“I have a bunch of songs to record, but I’m going to record three more. I think I’m gonna do like a 7-8 song mini-album. I like the mini-album idea.”  

Baierley released his first EP, Separate Checks, in 2023. He describes his music as falling under the rock genre. “My first album, I kinda wanted each song to be pulled from a different vibe, and hopefully the thing has some sort of cohesion about it, but I try to be as eclectic about it as possible.” He states his main goal is to sound “more like myself than anyone else.” 

Another aim Baierley has is to make “a conscious effort to actually want to have the listener be able to put themselves in the song, and that has taken a fair amount of time to get there…”  As stated in previous quotes, Baierley leans toward an eccentric, veiled meaning in his work, but with time, he has grown to enjoy the idea of people understanding and sympathizing with his lyrics.  

What has been the best part of your journey/career so far?  

“Releasing Separate Checks. Thank you to my dear friend Zach Shafer, who was the one who produced it and played a lot of the instruments.” Baierley has had unfond previous recording experiences, but once he met Shafer, in Austin, he had “never found myself so listenable,” stating it was probably the most fulfilling experience thus far.  

What do you enjoy about creating music? 

“You have this eureka moment where you finally find the right line or chord that connects service to that, where it has a natural, it’s always been there feel, that is one of my favorite things. Because I haven’t really had it in many other aspects in life where you just find this thing, like the missing link, that you felt was always there.” 

Baierley adores playing amongst musicians as well, having been in two bands, Brown Shoe (which he did not fancy the name of) and Vujade. Currently, he favors playing alone and amongst his friends, “I love sounding like a band when it’s just two people, I love it so much.” 

In Baierley’s parting words, he takes time to state his love and awe for music. “Everyone should appreciate their love of music, because it’s kind of astounding how it’s just sound waves in the air, and it means something? I don’t know, having music just be important, I’m so glad that it is for me, it’s definitely defined a part of who I am.” 

Keith Baierley’s Spotify is A Keithing, be sure to listen to his first EP and be on the lookout for his new “mini-album” coming soon.