Diana Silvers on Her Debut Album ‘From Another Room’ and Following Folk Heroes by Speaking Truth to Power: ‘If Your Art Doesn’t Scare You, It’s Not Really Worth It’ (EXCLUSIVE)
Diana Silvers is right where she’s supposed to be.
The 27-year-old actress and model — who you may recognize from films like “Booksmart” and “Ma” or high-profile campaigns for Celine and Prada — has been charting a new path in music lately, making her live debut at the storied Newport Folk Festival in July before joining the Grammy- and Oscar-winning musician Jon Batiste on his sold-out “Big Money” tour across the U.S. With all of this happening before she officially released any music of her own, calling the past few months a whirlwind would be an understatement.
“When I first got home, I think I sat on my couch and cried for five minutes,” Silvers tells Variety over Zoom from her apartment in New York City, back for a weeklong break before the tour’s final stretch. “I feel very, very lucky and privileged that opening for Jon is my first experience with touring. And I do not take it for granted. It’s been, honestly, an unbelievably transformative experience.”
After I ask how she got here, Silvers suddenly sounds distant. “Sorry if you hear me shuffling away from my computer for one second because I’m gonna grab my journal,” she says from across the room before settling back into her chair. Here, Silvers has kept track of every “serendipitous moment” and sign from the universe during her trek; the one she shares with me happened in Austin, Texas, while on the hunt for coffee at 4 p.m. (which, it turns out, is a daunting task when not in NYC).
“Nothing was open and I was in a weird part of town, but I went to this one place and there was a jar of fortune cookies,” she says. “I dug around, grabbed one and opened it, and it said: ‘Keep true to the dreams of your youth.'”
Silvers grew up in Los Angeles in a household of classical musicians, where her instrument of choice was the cello. At 10 years old, after discovering artists like Taylor Swift and Avril Lavigne, she begged her father to let her pick up the guitar. “He was like, ‘Girls don’t play guitar.’ And I was like, ‘Well, that’s not true!’ So I started teaching myself guitar in secret,” she says. Silvers also began writing songs, but kept her artistry behind closed doors — except for the occasional Joni Mitchell cover posted to her Instagram — until her Newport performance over the summer. In September, she released her first single from her forthcoming debut album “From Another Room” (out this Friday via Capitol Records) — a sun-soaked, Wurlitzer piano-led tribute to new love titled “June.” That very month was on the back of the fortune, Silvers reveals.
“I was like, that’s insane that this fortune has the name of my first single,” she continues. “And I bring this up because what I’ve noticed is I feel the most myself and the most connected to my inner child when I am singing and playing music. It’s just the purest form of expression.”
So what took her so long to let her voice be heard? Silvers simply didn’t feel that she had anything to say — until September 2024, when a song “came out like a stream of consciousness” after a plane ride from New York back to Calgary, Canada, where she was shooting the upcoming Netflix Western series “The Abandons.” Filming the show was a “really challenging experience,” Silvers says, and on top of that she was reading “Missoula,” the 2015 book by Jon Krakauer that recounts a series of sexual assaults at the University of Montana that were ultimately linked back to the school’s football team. As the plane flew over the Rocky Mountains, a newborn baby girl the row in front of her began to cry, and Silvers watched as a grown man grew visibly irritated.
“I was like, this is all so unfair,” Silvers says. “This baby, she’s brand new to the world and there’s already a man who has it out for her, you know what I mean? Just by her being, there’s already a man that’s angry about her existence. She doesn’t deserve to know the fear already.”
On the somber track “Airplane” — Silvers’ second single, released Oct. 10 — she captures poignantly how it feels to move through this world as a woman, and how for many of us, fear is a feeling all too familiar. “I was only 15/ And now I’m scared,” Silvers croons over a softly strummed guitar, before the chorus repeats: “I fear what I feel/ I fear what I feel/ I fear what I feel.”
“For centuries, men have abused and used and shamed and humiliated and gaslit women for their own personal amusement and personal gain, and the question somehow always ended up as, and continues to be — ‘Well, what did she do to bring that abuse upon herself?'” Silvers wrote in her newsletter the day “Airplane” debuted. “It’s a question I’ve asked myself too many times. Was I too nice? Did he mistake my kindness for something more? Was I too this? Was I too that? What did I do to deserve this? It’s the questioning I hope and pray my generation’s daughters won’t have to ask themselves.”
Writing “Airplane” was the call to action that Silvers needed. “I was like, ‘This song scares the hell out of me, but I think this is important,'” she remembers. “And then a little over a month later, fucking — excuse my language — Donald Trump gets reelected and I was like, man, OK. I really have something I need to say, because I’m so angry. But I don’t just want to be angry, I want to do something with this energy and mobilize it. And as someone who is inspired by artists over history who have courageously spoken out through their art, I was like, ‘I need to put it out there, into the world, because I think that we deserve better.'”
Indeed, it seems that the speaking-truth-to-power spirit of folk giants before her, like Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell, lives on in Silvers. Their sound does too — Silvers’ mezzo-soprano voice has already been compared to that of Mitchell, and her plainspoken lyricism has a certain Dylan-esque quality to it. All of this, plus simple guitar or piano instrumentals and Silvers’ insistence on recording every track live in one take, makes “From Another Room” sound like it’s from another time. Recorded at the legendary Electric Lady Studios in New York, it was imperative to Silvers that her album sound raw and without gimmicks or filters, which she made sure of by self-producing it alongside studio managing partner Lee Foster. The result is a nostalgic, thoughtful introduction of an artist with her heart on her sleeve — from “For Dad’s” soul-wrenching rumination on the passage of time to the hopeful, salted-air sweetness of “Big Sur” to a eulogy for a love lost too young on “The Dream.”
As for releasing some of her most vulnerable feelings into the world, Silvers admits she’s weary. “But if your art doesn’t scare you a little bit, it’s not really worth it,” she says. “I think for me, the cathartic part was writing and making the songs. And now, to release it into the world is to let go. My hope and my wish is that these songs, this record, whatever I make moving forward — that someone listens and sees themself in it, you know?”
Silvers is also designing the vinyl for “From Another Room,” which will contain a secret track. “I just want this to be a weird thing that’s only on the vinyl because some of my favorite artists have done that too,” she says. “It’s a nice little surprise to get to at the end, because it keeps spinning and you’re like, ‘Wait!’ You think it’s over and then it’s not.”
Diving headfirst into music has fueled Silvers’ other creative pursuits, including her desire to direct. She helmed both music videos for “June” and “Airplane,” showing off her unique, vintage-inspired vision and employing all-female crews.
“I’ve just been learning so much over the years being on the receiving end as the actor or model, taking direction and seeing how these sets operate,” she says. “And to then step into the role of like, OK, how do I communicate my creative ideas in a way that is productive and kind? It’s just really fun.”
And as for balancing her still-thriving acting career with music, Silvers plans on letting curiosity reign.
“As long as what I’m doing is fulfilling and brings me joy and pushes that curiosity, that’s what I’ll follow. Presently, it’s definitely music,” she says. “Simultaneously, it’s like hey, if Sofia Coppola wants to make a movie, I’m not gonna say no. I just am open — I feel very open right now to whatever the universe and life wants to throw at me.”
The 27-year-old actress and model — who you may recognize from films like “Booksmart” and “Ma” or high-profile campaigns for Celine and Prada — has been charting a new path in music lately, making her live debut at the storied Newport Folk Festival in July before joining the Grammy- and Oscar-winning musician Jon Batiste on his sold-out “Big Money” tour across the U.S. With all of this happening before she officially released any music of her own, calling the past few months a whirlwind would be an understatement.
“When I first got home, I think I sat on my couch and cried for five minutes,” Silvers tells Variety over Zoom from her apartment in New York City, back for a weeklong break before the tour’s final stretch. “I feel very, very lucky and privileged that opening for Jon is my first experience with touring. And I do not take it for granted. It’s been, honestly, an unbelievably transformative experience.”
After I ask how she got here, Silvers suddenly sounds distant. “Sorry if you hear me shuffling away from my computer for one second because I’m gonna grab my journal,” she says from across the room before settling back into her chair. Here, Silvers has kept track of every “serendipitous moment” and sign from the universe during her trek; the one she shares with me happened in Austin, Texas, while on the hunt for coffee at 4 p.m. (which, it turns out, is a daunting task when not in NYC).
“Nothing was open and I was in a weird part of town, but I went to this one place and there was a jar of fortune cookies,” she says. “I dug around, grabbed one and opened it, and it said: ‘Keep true to the dreams of your youth.'”
Silvers grew up in Los Angeles in a household of classical musicians, where her instrument of choice was the cello. At 10 years old, after discovering artists like Taylor Swift and Avril Lavigne, she begged her father to let her pick up the guitar. “He was like, ‘Girls don’t play guitar.’ And I was like, ‘Well, that’s not true!’ So I started teaching myself guitar in secret,” she says. Silvers also began writing songs, but kept her artistry behind closed doors — except for the occasional Joni Mitchell cover posted to her Instagram — until her Newport performance over the summer. In September, she released her first single from her forthcoming debut album “From Another Room” (out this Friday via Capitol Records) — a sun-soaked, Wurlitzer piano-led tribute to new love titled “June.” That very month was on the back of the fortune, Silvers reveals.
“I was like, that’s insane that this fortune has the name of my first single,” she continues. “And I bring this up because what I’ve noticed is I feel the most myself and the most connected to my inner child when I am singing and playing music. It’s just the purest form of expression.”
So what took her so long to let her voice be heard? Silvers simply didn’t feel that she had anything to say — until September 2024, when a song “came out like a stream of consciousness” after a plane ride from New York back to Calgary, Canada, where she was shooting the upcoming Netflix Western series “The Abandons.” Filming the show was a “really challenging experience,” Silvers says, and on top of that she was reading “Missoula,” the 2015 book by Jon Krakauer that recounts a series of sexual assaults at the University of Montana that were ultimately linked back to the school’s football team. As the plane flew over the Rocky Mountains, a newborn baby girl the row in front of her began to cry, and Silvers watched as a grown man grew visibly irritated.
“I was like, this is all so unfair,” Silvers says. “This baby, she’s brand new to the world and there’s already a man who has it out for her, you know what I mean? Just by her being, there’s already a man that’s angry about her existence. She doesn’t deserve to know the fear already.”
On the somber track “Airplane” — Silvers’ second single, released Oct. 10 — she captures poignantly how it feels to move through this world as a woman, and how for many of us, fear is a feeling all too familiar. “I was only 15/ And now I’m scared,” Silvers croons over a softly strummed guitar, before the chorus repeats: “I fear what I feel/ I fear what I feel/ I fear what I feel.”
“For centuries, men have abused and used and shamed and humiliated and gaslit women for their own personal amusement and personal gain, and the question somehow always ended up as, and continues to be — ‘Well, what did she do to bring that abuse upon herself?'” Silvers wrote in her newsletter the day “Airplane” debuted. “It’s a question I’ve asked myself too many times. Was I too nice? Did he mistake my kindness for something more? Was I too this? Was I too that? What did I do to deserve this? It’s the questioning I hope and pray my generation’s daughters won’t have to ask themselves.”
Writing “Airplane” was the call to action that Silvers needed. “I was like, ‘This song scares the hell out of me, but I think this is important,'” she remembers. “And then a little over a month later, fucking — excuse my language — Donald Trump gets reelected and I was like, man, OK. I really have something I need to say, because I’m so angry. But I don’t just want to be angry, I want to do something with this energy and mobilize it. And as someone who is inspired by artists over history who have courageously spoken out through their art, I was like, ‘I need to put it out there, into the world, because I think that we deserve better.'”
Indeed, it seems that the speaking-truth-to-power spirit of folk giants before her, like Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell, lives on in Silvers. Their sound does too — Silvers’ mezzo-soprano voice has already been compared to that of Mitchell, and her plainspoken lyricism has a certain Dylan-esque quality to it. All of this, plus simple guitar or piano instrumentals and Silvers’ insistence on recording every track live in one take, makes “From Another Room” sound like it’s from another time. Recorded at the legendary Electric Lady Studios in New York, it was imperative to Silvers that her album sound raw and without gimmicks or filters, which she made sure of by self-producing it alongside studio managing partner Lee Foster. The result is a nostalgic, thoughtful introduction of an artist with her heart on her sleeve — from “For Dad’s” soul-wrenching rumination on the passage of time to the hopeful, salted-air sweetness of “Big Sur” to a eulogy for a love lost too young on “The Dream.”
As for releasing some of her most vulnerable feelings into the world, Silvers admits she’s weary. “But if your art doesn’t scare you a little bit, it’s not really worth it,” she says. “I think for me, the cathartic part was writing and making the songs. And now, to release it into the world is to let go. My hope and my wish is that these songs, this record, whatever I make moving forward — that someone listens and sees themself in it, you know?”
Silvers is also designing the vinyl for “From Another Room,” which will contain a secret track. “I just want this to be a weird thing that’s only on the vinyl because some of my favorite artists have done that too,” she says. “It’s a nice little surprise to get to at the end, because it keeps spinning and you’re like, ‘Wait!’ You think it’s over and then it’s not.”
Diving headfirst into music has fueled Silvers’ other creative pursuits, including her desire to direct. She helmed both music videos for “June” and “Airplane,” showing off her unique, vintage-inspired vision and employing all-female crews.
“I’ve just been learning so much over the years being on the receiving end as the actor or model, taking direction and seeing how these sets operate,” she says. “And to then step into the role of like, OK, how do I communicate my creative ideas in a way that is productive and kind? It’s just really fun.”
And as for balancing her still-thriving acting career with music, Silvers plans on letting curiosity reign.
“As long as what I’m doing is fulfilling and brings me joy and pushes that curiosity, that’s what I’ll follow. Presently, it’s definitely music,” she says. “Simultaneously, it’s like hey, if Sofia Coppola wants to make a movie, I’m not gonna say no. I just am open — I feel very open right now to whatever the universe and life wants to throw at me.”