Multicultural Kānaka Maoli singer songwriter, Isabeau Waia’u Walker, has had to get creative to attempt the question of genre: “bright gloom,” “joy adjacent;” “island of broken, demented toys.” Hailing from her homeland Hawaii and having spent the latter half of her life in Oregon’s Pacific Northwest. Unless touring with Y La Bamba, in which she sings backup vocals, her feet and roots are always close to the shores of the Pacific Ocean (yearning for and pulled by her packs). Experience, observations and negotiations with race, culture, gender and class are inextricably woven into her purpose and product. Songs of love. Songs of community and fight, of life and self. She lives in attractive vulnerability and sincere humility despite the power of her performances and songs. An early retirement as a full time secondary school teacher in 2019 has allowed her to tour, play local shows, and record more, releasing her EP, Better Metric, in 2020, then her first LP, Body, in 2022, with engineer, bandmate and friend Ryan Oxford at The Center for Sound, Light and Color. Since those releases she’s unsurprisingly caught the attention of and has been featured in and on several publications, podcasts and programs such as OPB, Live Wire Radio, Vortex Music Magazine, Willamette Week, KEXP. Isabeau dedicated the last year and a half to the release of her third record, an LP titled Heavyweight, out October 2024.
Maximiano’s music is rarely about just one emotion, moment, or person. Their debut album, “The Real Truth,” instead explores the way that experience flows through periods of growth and change. The songs shimmer, echo, and glide through tales of memory and identity that Piet Levy of The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel called “one of the most piercing and emotionally resonant collections of songs from a Milwaukee artist of the year… a towering achievement.”
The album, which Maximiano wrote, produced, arranged, recorded, and mixed, is adorned with a variety of sounds; piano, pedal steel, flute, clarinet, and more elevate the indie-folk core. With an all-star band of Milwaukee musicians (including members of Field Report, PHOX, Old Pup, and Ellie Jackson), the vulnerable americana-folk songs swell to cathartic, indie-rock peaks. Riding the waves of this folkestra, Maximiano sings tenderly but urgently about taking chances, missed opportunities, and reevaluating memories. The result is a flowing, expressive sound that, according to Erin Wolf, music director at 88.9 Radio Milwaukee, “captures the beauty that often comes from the newfound wisdom accrued in your stumbling, youngest years.”
“The Real Truth” is a lush, courageous, and ambitious first record from an artist poised to take up the lineage of earnest, folk-influenced singer-songwriters. Though their music will appeal to fans of Adrianne Lenker, Songs:Ohia, Sufjan Stevens, and Elliott Smith, the real truth is that there is no one quite like Maximiano.
Nathaniel Heuer is a musician and woodworker living in Milwaukee. He currently writes, records, and performs with some of Milwaukee’s preeminent bands, including genre-bending Group of the Altos (The Altos), experimental rockers Marielle Allschwang and The Visitations, and his own indie folk project Hello Death.