Malin Pettersen is a Norweigan singer – songwriter / musician who is a rising star in both Nashville and the Nordicana movement. She has shared bills with the likes of Emmylou Harris, Rodney Crowell, Brad Paisley, Jim Lauderdale, Colter Wall, Charlie Crockett, Kelsey Waldon, Mollie Tuttle, Erin Rae, Nikki Lane, and Jaime Wyatt and has toured as support for Sam Outlaw, Whitney Rose and Joshua Hedley. Her new album Wildhorse , which was recorded in Nashville and features an all-star band of musicians including Aaron Goodrich, Misa Arriaga, Ryan A. Keith, and Eddy Dunlap, is due to be released October 16. Recently I spoke with the charismatic and talented Pettersen about her songwriting process, her love of American music, and her new album.
Americana Highways: How would you best describe your songwriting process?
Malin Pettersen: It often differs on how long it takes for me to write a song. Some are written in hours, some in days, weeks, or years. And the process itself used to be pretty monotonous in that I would just sit down with my guitar and start playing something and try to sing something on top of it, making up the words as I went along. But after a long writer’s block in my early 20’s I decided to start exploring different techniques and that has definitely helped make me a better and more diverse songwriter. Sometimes I’ll improvise melodies and see if something appears that I like and that I can work with. Sometimes I’ll look through old notebooks and look for single lines to see if they spark something. Sometimes I’ll sit down with my guitar and just start playing to see what comes out. Sometimes I’ll slap a capo high on the guitar to see if it brings new melody ideas to me. And sometimes, if I’m in a period of writer’s block – I’ll just write all the bad songs in my head, and then something worth moving forward with will suddenly reveal itself.