You Might Also Like: Elton John Impact Awards

**Orville Peck** (0:08)
Often, we'll have couples in their 80s who are just like old school country fans at my show, standing next to a drag queen, standing next to a black punk kid. It's just the coolest thing. It's so special.

**Elvis Duran** (0:23)
This is the Elton John Impact Awards, celebrating the cultural icon's championing equality for everyone.

**Orville Peck** (0:30)
It sounds a little pageant, but I can really say that being able to be a source of comfort or representation, or an example or inspiration for other queer people to either do what I do or heal through what I do, that's like one of the greatest things, I think, of my career.

**Elvis Duran** (0:54)
Orville Peck is a boundary pushing country artist whose rich baritone cinematic style and his proudly queer perspective are expanding what country music can actually be.
Orville was wearing one of his signature masks, but the conversation was incredibly revealing. This is going to be a lot of fun. One of our honorees for the Elton John Impact Award is here, Orville Peck. Hi, Orville. Thanks for being on with us.

**Orville Peck** (1:18)
Hello. Thank you for having me.

**Elvis Duran** (1:21)
Let's have some fun because you scream fun. I've seen you in concert and I saw you in Cabaret here in New York City with mask off.

**Orville Peck** (1:29)
That's right. Yeah.

**Elvis Duran** (1:30)
Was it a relief to put it back on? Were you like, oh, thank God, it's over. I can put my mask on.

**Orville Peck** (1:35)
Yeah, kind of. I mean, you know, I definitely feel like mask on is like a safer feeling for me. But I don't know. It was such an involved character and such a like the show is obviously so it's got so much depth and importance that I kind of felt like I was wearing a mask anyway. So it wasn't too jarring, but definitely have flashbacks to like mid show realization, like, oh, wait, I have no mask on right for sure.

**Elvis Duran** (2:01)
I guess you use the character you were playing as your mask. I guess that would make sense.

**Orville Peck** (2:05)
Yeah, exactly.

**Elvis Duran** (2:07)
So if you had to convince me to wear a mask, let's say you're a billionaire making money off masks and you want to convince. Like, what's your sales pitch? Like, here's why you should think about wearing a mask. It's worked out for me. It'll work out for you. What is that?

**Orville Peck** (2:20)
I mean, the things I like about it are, at least for me, it's allowed me the sort of freedom and confidence to be way more vulnerable than when I don't wear it. And also, I mean, the nice thing for me is like, it's allowed me a lot of separation from the entertainment industry and being able to kind of like just live my life more anonymously, I guess.

**Elvis Duran** (2:43)
Well, you can live your life as anonymously as you want. But once I listen to the music you've written, there's no mystery there, in my opinion. It seems like you lay it all out on the line. There's no mask on your music.

**Orville Peck** (2:53)
Yeah, I think that's sort of the intersection that I was going for, is like, you know, this kind of very theatrical persona image, but combining that with ultra sincerity. All my lyrics are very, very personal. And so I think that kind of like intersection of art has always fascinated me.

**Elvis Duran** (3:12)
You're a masterful storyteller through your music. You actually put across your feelings very, very succinctly, especially about love and loss and being lonely. And I mean, there's no mystery there. When you sit down to write a song, what process do you go through in your head? Or does a song pop up in your head and you go, I got to get to a computer now and write this thing. Where does it come from?

**Orville Peck** (3:36)
It's kind of all over the place. But I mean, typically, I think I start with a feeling and sort of a moment in either real time or thinking about, you know, how I could share an interesting story about something that's happened to me in the past. I never grew up as a technical musician. I didn't take music lessons and things like that. And so I taught myself pretty much everything that I know how to play. And so I definitely approach music more visually than kind of, I guess, like sonically a lot of the time.

**Elvis Duran** (4:06)
Well, don't learn more about that stuff. Just stick with what you're doing. Once you start learning all those technical things, it may just screw up everything. And you don't want to do that.