SN: Mental Health in Music, Orphan Prodigy on Anxiety, Exposure Therapy, and 'Medication For a Modern World'

Spare Notes: Mental Health in Music.How does music help us process emotion? What does it mean to truly be seen? And what is the distance between who we are and who we think we need to be?These questions are prevelant in Orphan Prodigy's latest album, Medication for a Modern World and in this interview. It's a title that feels especially relevant today. We live in a world of constant stimulation, endless expectations, and a culture that often asks us to keep producing, keep performing, and keep moving. So what becomes our medication? Is it therapy? Music? Community? Exercise? Authenticity? Or is it learning to build a life that works with our minds instead of against them?For artists, these questions become even more personal. Creating meaningful work often means balancing creativity with survival, vulnerability with expectation, and finding ways to keep making art in a world that doesn't always make space for it.In this interview, Jonah Evans is joined by Ian Keller and Danielle Hope of Orphan Prodigy. What began as a conversation about music and mental health became something much larger. They talk about panic disorder, adoption, exposure therapy, authenticity, and what it means to stop chasing the version of yourself you think the world wants and start building a life around who you really are.Orphan Prodigy: https://orphanprodigy.com/IG: https://www.instagram.com/orphanprodigy/Photo by: Francisco GalloJonah Evans: https://jonahinthesnow.com/Spare Notes Substack: https://sparenotes.substack.com/Intro Music "XXO" from the album Teeth by Magana: https://maganarama.bandcamp.com/album/teeth